


Momento Mori

by KeyWolf25888



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Depression, Getting Together, Kidnapping, M/M, Modern Bucky Barnes, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-25
Updated: 2019-10-25
Packaged: 2021-01-02 16:54:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 49,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21164981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KeyWolf25888/pseuds/KeyWolf25888
Summary: Bucky hasn’t been able to stand being anywhere near his death for a long time now. Or, at least that’s what it feels like. His parents are beginning to despair.Maybe it’ll take getting to know someone close to their death to help him out.





	Momento Mori

**Author's Note:**

> You know when you write something, and when it's done you look at it and you're like, what the heck is this? Yeah, that's me with this fic. It's.... certainly something, but maybe you'll enjoy reading it, I don't even know.
> 
> Banner and title card for this fic was done by the wonderful [Taste_Is_Sweet](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Taste_is_Sweet/works?page=1) (for real thank you for putting up with me ^_^) :) You can view the banner [here](https://i.imgur.com/nNrX903.jpg) :)

_"Doesn’t it scare you, having your death close by all the time?” said Lyra._

_“Why ever would it? If he’s there, you can keep an eye on him. I’d be a lot more nervous not knowing where he was.”_

_“And everyone has their own death?” said Will, marvelling._

_“Why yes, the moment you’re born, your death comes into the world with you, and it’s your death that takes you out.” _

_[…] _

_“Your death taps you on the shoulder, or takes your hand, and says, come along o’ me, it’s time […]”_

Phillip Pullman, The Amber Spyglass

Bucky sighed. It wasn’t the first time, and it wouldn’t be the last time. It didn’t stop his mom from giving him a disapproving look though.

He kicked his feet agitatedly.

“Why don’t you go get yourself some candy?” His mom said after a few minutes of this. “I know this is boring for you, but Becca’s going to be in there for quite a while longer. You just need to be a bit more patient.”

Bucky eyeballed the coins his mom held out to him. “Thanks,” he muttered, snatching them away.

As he stood up, his death went to follow him. Waiting until he was out of the room, he turned to his death. “Can you believe we’re having to wait around for Becca to be done? It’s not like she’s even sick anyway,” he groused.

His death nodded. “I know,” they said. Their hand placed itself on Bucky’s back, guiding him along the corridor.

It made Bucky feel a bit better to have his death with him, reminding him that everything was fine. He walked along the corridor, looking out for the vending machine that he was sure that he had seen on the way in.

It was after they’d been walking for a few minutes that Bucky realised he might have taken a wrong turning somewhere. The vending machine hadn’t been that far away from where Becca’s room was, he had been sure – but as he looked around, there was no sign of anything other than hospital rooms.

A small amount of panic set in. Backing into his death, he took comfort in the cool cloth his death wore, knowing that they would be there to guide him. Gulping, he looked down the corridor. “We should keep looking,” he said decisively, taking his death’s hand in his. Just like the cloak, it was cool to the touch, and he dragged his death along behind him, the easy glide making it effortless, despite his small stature.

Finally, out of the harsh lighting of the corridor, he spied a strip of black, a sign of treats yet to come. Hurrying towards it, feeling the coins jangling in his pocket, he arrived at a vending machine at long last.

“What do you think I should get?” He mused, looking up and down at the options available. Half of the spaces were empty, their coils exposed, and the ones that were left were the ones that Bucky didn’t like. His death didn’t reply, but that was okay, Bucky was a big boy now and he could choose his own snacks.

He examined the money his mom had given him. There were a lot of coins there, adding up to a whopping $3.25. It would buy him almost anything on offer, only he still didn’t know which one he wanted.

Deciding to pick at random, he plugged in one of the codes for a candy bar. Putting the money in, he was delighted when he got to watch the coils spin and drop his delicious, delicious candy into the tray at the bottom.

Scrabbling to get at it, he ripped it open gleefully and took a big bite.

“Let’s go!” He said through a mouthful of chocolate.

They began to head back in the direction of Becca’s room. Bucky had to admit that he was dragging his feet on purpose, trying to go slower. When all he was going to do was have to sit in a boring room and wait for Becca to be done with her tests, there was no reason he should have to go there soon, as far as he was concerned.

And maybe he spent a little too much time watching his feet, looking at his candy, and trying to read the names on all the doors to watch where he was going.

Looking this way and that, he realised with a frightening start that he didn’t know if he’d come down this corridor already. All the corridors looked the same, with the same yellowy beige walls and floors, and that weird smell that reminded him of when his mom would clean the bathroom.

“Are we going the right way?” He looked up at his death with fearful eyes.

His death stayed silent, as they often did.

Gulping, he tried walking slower, trying to see if there was anything he recognised.

So far there wasn’t – or at least, he didn’t think there was. It was as he was doing this that he accidentally looked into one of the rooms that was on this corridor, the door left ajar enough that he could see a bit of what was inside.

“…okay, your turn!” It was the voice of another young boy! Curiosity activated, Bucky crept closer, almost sticking his whole head in the door in his haste to see what was going on.

Inside, there was a small, thin boy with blonde hair. He had pyjamas on, big thick fleecy ones that looked really warm. He was sat propped up by pillows, his death perched sideways, their cloak spilling out over the duvet like an ink spill. A chess board was set out between them, balanced on the boy’s lap. Bucky had never played chess, but sometimes his dad would let him look at his set, and tell him that one day he would teach him to play.

The boy looked up and locked eyes with him.

Crap, clearly he hadn’t been as hidden as he’d thought.

“Come in!” The boy whisper-shouted, sitting forward. Well that was surprising – but Bucky couldn’t dent that he wanted to see what was going on.

Pushing the door open, he let himself and his death in, before closing the door again in case they got caught. Bucky was sure that he wasn’t supposed to be in someone else’s room, but he didn’t care right now.

“Who are you?” He said as he got closer to the boy.

The boy grinned, showing off gaps where several of his teeth were missing. “I’m Steve!” He said excitedly. “What’s your name?”

“Bucky,” Bucky said, scuffling one foot along the ground. “How come you’re in your own room?”

“I got sick,” was Steve’s simple answer. “My mom said that I had to stay here so I could get better. I think I would have gotten better with her here, but she said she couldn’t stay.” He pouted. “But I have my death to play chess with me. And now I have you!”

“Yeah!” Bucky grinned. He put one hand on the bed. “Can I sit on here?”

“Sure!” Steve shuffled his legs to the side. Bucky clambered on – it was a bit higher than his bed at home, which offset his balance a bit. He ended up putting one hand on Steve’s leg by accident, and he could feel how bony it was, like there was no muscle on it at all. (Bucky had been learning all about bones and muscles at school, and was pretty much an expert on them by now. There should definitely have been more muscle on Steve’s legs.)

He didn’t say anything about it though – he was too busy looking at the chessboard, which Steve still had on his lap.

“So why are you here?” Steve asked, drawing Bucky’s attention away from the board.

Bucky shrugged. “I was trying to get back to where my mom and my sister are, but I think I got lost and then I found your room.”

Steve laughed, throwing his whole head back as he did. Bucky stared. “Not why you’re in my room, silly,” Steve said, still giggling. “Why are you in the hospital?”

“Oh,” Bucky said, feeling a bit silly, “my sister thinks she’s got something wrong with her, so my mom brought her here to get some doctors to do some tests on her. Only it ended up taking forever, so they’re keeping her overnight, but my mom doesn’t want to leave her, so I’ve got to stay too.” He kicked his feet a little in frustration. “It’s not fair that I’ve got to stay too though,” he added, “because Becca gets a proper bed, and I’ve just gotta sleep in a dumb chair.”

“Is your sister okay?” Steve asked, his eyes wide.

Bucky shrugged. “I dunno. I think she’s fine, because if she wasn’t her death would have said something, right? And anyway, she doesn’t seem that sick to me.”

“Oh…” Steve said. Then, after a pause, “so you’re going to be going home tomorrow?” He sounded sad.

Bucky shrugged again. “I dunno,” he said. “I guess if Becca’s feeling better, then yeah.” He looked at Steve. “How long have you been in here?”

Steve’s face screwed up with concentration. “Um… a few weeks?” He said, sounding like he was guessing.

Bucky gasped. “That long?” He exclaimed, surprised. That was so much time – he couldn’t even imagine staying here for more than a few days.

“I know…” Steve still sounded sad.

“Well at least it means you get time off school,” Bucky offered, in an attempt to make Steve feel better. “I got to have tomorrow off, and I’m super excited. If Becca’s feeling better, we’re gonna get our Pokémon cards out and play.”

Steve frowned. “I don’t really go to school anyway,” he said.

“Woah, really? Lucky!” Sometimes Bucky loved school, but most of the time it was boring. His teachers never laughed at his jokes, and sometimes the other kids could be mean. He wished he didn’t have to go either, if it meant he could sit around and play chess all day.

“It’s not that fun,” Steve said, his face drawn. “They do lots of tests on me, and they’re really boring and sometimes they hurt.” Then he perked up a little. “But I guess if you came to see me sometimes, that wouldn’t be so bad!”

Bucky grinned so hard his cheeks hurt. “Sure!” He said, already imagining all the great times they were going to have.

Then his eyes fell on the chessboard again. “Can we play?”

Steve looked down at it. “But we were in the middle of the game,” he whined, wrapping a protective arm around it.

Bucky blinked. “We?”

“Yeah, me and my death.” Steve looked at him as though he was stupid – which Bucky knew he wasn’t.

“Your death plays games with you?” Bucky practically gaped at Steve. Glancing behind him, he saw the two deaths sitting on the bed behind them, stoic as they ever were, silently watching them from beneath their cowls.

Steve nodded. “Yeah, doesn’t yours?”

Bucky did gape this time. “No! I didn’t think anyone’s did!”

“Well mine does,” Steve said simply. “They keep me company.”

Bucky had never heard of such a thing. He’d never seen anyone’s death do more than keep them safe, not even his parents’. It was such a strange concept that he almost didn’t want to accept it. Perhaps Steve had been playing by himself, and had imagined that it was his death playing with him. that made more sense.

“Tell me about school.” Steve changed the topic, looking down at his lap bashfully.

“Are you sure? It’s really boring,” Bucky warned him. When Steve nodded enthusiastically, Bucky began to tell him about what they’d been learning about in their history lesson recently. It was something to do with the wild west and cowboys, and it had mainly stuck in Bucky’s head because he thought it was a bit like the old western films his mom liked to watch sometimes.

A beeping distracted Bucky from the story he was telling Steve about a battle they’d had at recess the other day. “What’s that?” He demanded.

“Sorry,” Steve said, immediately apologetic. “I have to take some pills now.”

Reaching over, he took hold of the glass of water on his bedside table. Picking up a few pills that were laying beside it, he swallowed them with ease. This particularly impressed Bucky, since he always had trouble taking any kind of medicine, despite his mom’s best efforts.

This pause made Bucky realise that he had been here for quite a while. There was no way to know exactly how long, but his mom might have noticed that he was missing by now.

“I should probably go,” he said, just as Steve was finishing swallowing.

Steve pouted. “Do you have to?” He asked. “We could play chess, I don’t mind really.”

Bucky sighed. It was a tempting offer. He was getting tired though, and he didn’t actually want to make his mom mad at him for disappearing. She was already stressed with Becca being sick, he knew. “I have to,” he said, even if he really wanted to give in.

Steve began to look distressed. “Are you sure? I – I could –“ He broke off, coughing.

The coughs didn’t stop.

Horrified, Bucky looked at Steve’s death. They weren’t moving, but that didn’t mean anything, not when it was Bucky looking at them.

Tentatively, he patted Steve’s back, trying to make him feel better. If Steve died while he was in here it would be so awful. For him. he would get in so much trouble.

After a few minutes of heart-pounding, leg-shaking terror, Steve’s coughing slowed down. Particularly as they did, it was more and more clear to Bucky how painful they were for Steve – they sounded raspy, and scraping, and harsh, and each one wracked Steve’s body, making him tremble. Bucky couldn’t even imagine being so sick.

“Are you okay?” Bucky whispered, when the worst of it was over. Thinking fast, he grabbed the glass of water that Steve had drunk from before, holding it up to Steve’s lips.

Gratefully, Steve took the glass from him and took some sips. When he was done, he said, “I’m fine.” His voice had changed to be raspy, like his coughs had been. Ouch. “I think you’re right, you should go now. I’m sleepy.”

Eyes wide, Bucky slipped off the bed. “It was nice meeting you,” Bucky said, standing awkwardly in the middle of the room, one hand still on the bed.

Steve yawned. “You too,” he said, his eyelids beginning to droop. “Come back soon, yeah?”

“Yeah.” Bucky shuffled out of the room, his death following him.

He looked up at his death when they were out in the hall. “…Do you know how to get back to mom?” He didn’t usually bother to ask his death questions like that. But it was worth a try, right…?

Without a word, his death turned and walked up the corridor the way they had come. Following a step behind, Bucky was almost surprised when, after turning a few corners, he began to recognise the place. “Woah…” The whisper was to himself, but he was sure that his death heard it.

Bucky almost missed it when his death stopped outside one of the doors. “In here?” He asked, looking up at his death.

No response.

Bucky opened the door. His mom was in there. There was the same book on her lap that had been there before. It didn’t look like she’d read very much. Weird, since she usually read her books too fast.

He tried to close the door quietly. Naturally it made a loud bang, and his mom looked up. “Oh, there you are,” she said. Bucky wasn’t convinced that she even knew what she was saying. “Did you buy something good?”

Bucky nodded, pulling out the wrapper of his candy bar and showing it to her.

His mom looked at it with blank eyes. “Good, good.” She looked back down at her book again.

Bucky scuttled over to his chair. It was just as uncomfortable as it had been before. If only he could have stayed on Steve’s bed. At least that had been a bit soft.

It didn’t seem like his mom had noticed how long he’d been gone. Thank god. He could tell her about what he got up to tomorrow.

Maybe if she was feeling nice, she’d let him go visit Steve.

**

Steve sighed, staring at his canvas. The blank canvas stared back at him, taunting him with its emptiness and its lack of motivation. Well, no, the lack of motivation was all on Steve, but it was easier to pretend like it was the canvas’ fault.

Setting his paint brush down, he decided to go make himself a cup of tea. Maybe by the time he was done with that, he’d have had some inspiration.

His death followed him into the kitchen. Pulling out his boxes of tea, Steve set them side by side on the countertop. “Which one, do you think?” He asked.

There was no verbal response. His death did point a bony finger at the chamomile tea, though, so Steve took that as an answer, putting the kettle on.

As he waited for it to boil, he looked out of his apartment window. There were so many people walking outside – any one of them could be the inspiration for new art. If only one of them would catch his eyes.

Turning around he looked with a critical eye at all the other art propped up on the cabinets. (He didn’t have anywhere else to put them, really, and he just had to make do with the space he had in his apartment.) He knew that they were all too much the same. That was what he had been told any time he had tried to sell them. And every time he had used them in his college classes.

Each one – aside from a few which had been forced out of him – involved the painting of a death in some way.

He raked his eyes over them. How many ways could one person paint a death? Steve didn’t know, but he sure was vying for that particular award.

The kettle clicked, its boiling done. Thankful to take his mind off of it, Steve went to pour the hot water into his mug. It was tricky business – the countertops were just slightly too high for comfort, making the process slightly more difficult than it needed to be.

Wandering back into his art room/sometimes living room, he took a sip of his tea. Suddenly remembering that he was supposed to be keeping an eye on the time, he pulled out his phone to check the time. 15 minutes until he next needed to take his heart medication. (Having technology around to remind him to take his meds now that he lived on his own truly was a blessing.)

Taking slightly larger sip of his drink, he tried looking at the canvas again. Surely the more he tried, the more the ideas would come to him…

A flash of color caught his attention. It was his death, gliding through from the kitchen. Steve never knew what his death did in there without him, but he’d never wanted to ask.

As ever, the way his death swam through the air to stand behind him captivated him. Suppressing a groan, he picked up his paintbrush. Trying to capture the essence of his death had become a weird thing that he tended to do too often, he knew. It was part of the reason that so many of his paintings featured them.

The black paint was the first one he went for. It was terrible, but often the backgrounds of his paintings ended up being rather the least important part. That wasn’t always the case – sometimes they were the more important part, depending on what his inspiration decided would be the ~dramatic new angle~ he was going to make this time.

This time though, the emphasis was very much on trying to capture that elegance that deaths always exuded. He had gotten close to getting it before, but never closely enough. Maybe this time would be the time he succeeded.

Successively mixing his blacks with various small amounts of white, trying to get it to the place he wanted to be, he gave up a little and just ended up using pure black. It was close enough anyway – most people didn’t look at their deaths closely enough to notice that not everything about them was purely black.

With black splashed across the page, Steve knew that this time the subject would be the main focus of the painting.

As ever, painting put him in some kind of trance. He did his best to pay as much attention to what he was doing, to get out the image in his head.

He didn’t get far in before his phone alarm went off to tell him to take his meds. Rolling his eyes, he tried to ignore it for a minute, to try to get more done. It was in his head, and if he just twisted his wrist this way he’d be able to get it out and onto the page, finally…

Nope, it was too annoying. Frustratedly standing up, and kicking his stool a little, he went to turn the damn alarm off. “Yes, yes, I know I need to take them,” Steve muttered to himself as he flicked the alarm away.

It was having his notifications shoved in his face that made him realise that he had a message from his mom. Several, actually.

She wanted to come over. Shit.

Steve glanced over his apartment. It wasn’t _messy_, per se, it was just… a bit cluttered. not that his mom would see it that way.

Texting her back with ‘sure!’ like he wasn’t beginning to panic about the state of his apartment, he had to resist the urge to begin tidying immediately. Wishing this was one of the times where his death would help him out (it wasn’t an actual emergency, even if he treated it like one), he quickly went to take his medicine. It never did him any good when he forgot to take it, and if there was one thing his mom got on his ass more for than not tidying, it was forgetting to take his medicine.

Swallowing them dry with a grimace, Steve shuddered a little as he felt them go down.

Now, what to tidy first? Instinct said bedroom, but common sense said the places his mom was likely to see was probably a better place to start.

It took him 15 minutes of shunting everything into piles for him to feel confident that he wasn’t about to get told off for his front room. All the paintings that he could bear to stack against one another were so. (Privately he hoped that maybe he could persuade his mom to take a couple of them off his hands. There were only so many works of art you could make before you began to feel like you were drowning in them, no matter how much you liked them.) His easel was in the corner with them, his half-finished painting still in place. Ideally he would have hidden it somewhere, but there was no _time_ for that.

He checked his phone again, just in case. There was a message sent five minutes ago that his mom was setting off now. That could mean she would arrive from anywhere between ten minutes and half an hour from now.

Stepping into his bedroom, he gulped. Usually his bed wasn’t this messy (why did it have to be the day his mom wanted to come over??) but this morning he’d been extra zombie-like, and he hadn’t wanted to bother tidying up. If only it hadn’t been the day he had knocked his duvet to the floor in the night, along with about three cushions and subsequently everything on his desk.

Reminded of why he hated having such a small apartment, Steve walked in, only ducking his head slightly. He might be short, but even he wasn’t small enough for the sloped roof of his bedroom to not knock him on the head if he wasn’t careful.

What to tackle first?

The obvious answer was his bed. Hefting the duvet up (why did he have to buy such a heavy one?) he got it as straight as he could, before piling the blankets on top of it. He would never sleep with all of them on his bed, not unless it was the middle of winter, but it would do for tidiness purposes.

After a while longer of tiding (there were so many trinkets that needed putting back on his desk) he finally felt like it was maybe up to scratch. It was almost certain that his mom would find something out of place, but it was good enough.

He considered doing some more. His kitchen could probably do with a little more tidying. There was a little more leeway to a place which was constantly filling with dirty things –

A knock at the door.

Steve rushed to the door. Flinging it open, he proceeded to wrap his mom in a warm hug.

Taking it entirely in her stride, his mom chucked, and hugged him back. “How are you today, baby?”

Steve laughed, full of glee. “I’m good, mom, I’m good.”

His mom broke the hug, stepping back and putting her hands on his shoulders. “You look too skinny to me,” she said, her nurse’s eye taking over again. It was something that had plagued Steve when he was younger, but it wasn’t actually a bad thing.

He rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah.” He tried to make it as clear as possible that he meant it as a joke, and beckoned for his mom to come further in.

As she did, he also gave a smile to his mom’s death, their presence also welcome. If Steve was younger, he might have reached out and tried to touch them – but after growing up, it never felt like it would be welcome any more.

They ended up going and sitting down in the living room. As his mom sat, he noticed that she looked thinner than he would like. Feeling a little like they’d switched places momentarily, he did his best to ignore it. She’d been fine for months now. There was no need to worry about something that might not have come back.

“Do you want a drink, mom?” He asked her, trying to make sure that neither of them had to expend energy thinking about their health too often.

His mom seemed to consider this for a moment. “Yes, I would,” she said finally.

Steve practically jumped to get her what she wanted. Moving as quickly as he could, he went through the motions of putting the kettle on, and getting the mugs ready. It felt wrong to leave his mom in the living room almost right after her arrival, but neither did he want to make things feel longer by going through and then having to go back through to the kitchen already.

It was a slightly awkward position to be in, and Steve hated his own inability to not be awkward for making it happen.

Picking up the mugs (he couldn’t resist making a cup for himself too), he made his way through to the living room. Handing one mug to his mom, he took a seat next to her. (As he did, he sort of tried to shove a few of his paintings to the side with his leg. It wasn’t that he didn’t want his mom to see them – but she was sat where he usually did, and he hadn’t thought to clear any more room than that earlier.)

“You didn’t tell me you’d started on something new,” his mom said, looking around the room. “I like it.”

Steve felt like squirming. “Thanks,” he said, fighting the urge to hide everything away. Even with his mom’s familiar presence, he still didn’t feel like he wanted to show her any of it yet.

“Do you… do you not have anything other than deaths to show me?” She looked at him hopefully.

Steve deflated. “Not this time, mom,” he said, trying not to grit his teeth. He didn’t want to upset her, but he couldn’t lie either.

His mom pursed her lips, taking a sip of tea. “You promised me you’d try to work on something else, darling,” she said softly. There was no threat in her voice – merely disappointment.

Frankly, that was much worse than threats. “I know, mom,” he said, fiddling with his own mug. “I try, you know I do.”

His mom sighed. “Honey, I know you do. But do you not think you could try a little harder? For me?” Her voice was cajoling, like she thought that Steve was capable of simply changing the way his muse worked based on what he knew he should do.

Steve took a deep breath. “I do try, mom.” Then he remembered about a painting – a non-death-related on – that he’d begun last week. He stood up, trotting to the other side of the room and beginning to root through the piles and piles of canvases. “I swear I had it here…” he muttered to himself.

He could feel the gaze of his mom burning into his back. Trying his best to ignore it, he pulled more and more of them out, beginning to worry that he had somehow managed to misplace a whole canvass.

Then he saw it – shoved to the back of the pile, and almost indistinguishable from the rest. He pulled it out triumphantly.

“Look,” he said, turning it around so that his mom could see it. He watched her face for reaction – she usually liked his art a lot. This time seemed to be no exception – he watched as her mouth pulled up into a smile.

She reached for it, and he let her have it, no questions. “Oh, it’s wonderful,” she said, appraising it. “What inspired this one?”

He resisted the urge to tell the truth, which would have been ‘we were told to paint something entirely opposite to what we normally would, and nature fit the bill’. Instead – perhaps more kindly – he said, “oh, I just liked the colors.” It was sort of true – when he had realised that it would be his best bet to do that he had floundered, entirely unsure what he could possibly be interested in enough to turn out something decent, until he realised that the bright colors of the fall trees would do just nicely.

His mom grinned, wide and bright. “Oh honey, that’s wonderful.” Her reaction made him feel so good. He liked knowing that she was proud of him… even if it sort of felt undeserved this time.

“Thanks…” He said, smiling unconvincingly.

His mom didn’t even seem to notice that fact. “I’m so glad you’re branching out,” she said.

Then she began to sip at her drink again. As she did, Steve could see the way that her eyes really moved around the room, looking at all his art. He knew that she probably wouldn’t say anything to him about it – it had been a long time since he had begun to paint deaths.

Their meeting ended up getting cut short anyway. It was a shame – his mom was in the middle of an interesting anecdote about one of her co-workers who somehow lost their lunch in the employee breakroom, but then it had begun to rain. it had reminded her that she should leave before it got too late, and with that, she said goodbye to him.

As he ushered her out the door, he felt bad that he didn’t go see her often enough. They lived in the same city, it wasn’t like he had the excuse of having to travel very far to get to his childhood home. He just ended up being so caught up in his college work so often that he forgot that he would have to actually travel to see his mom, instead of having her in the next room.

Besides – he’d gotten used to not going home while she was in the hospital.

**

“Bucky!”

Warm. Too warm. No. Warm enough.

That was all that Bucky could comprehend. There was darkness, and soft blankets over him.

His eyes stayed closed.

“Bucky!”

That was his name. Being called.

Eyes still closed, he squeezed them tighter. Brain still sleepy, he made a noise which he hoped communicated ‘I’m sleepy leave me alone’.

Then light flooded his room. Making more grumpy noises, he buried himself further under his blankets, further into the cosy cocoon he’d made for himself overnight.

“Honey? Are you awake?” His mom’s voice was loud in the room, compared to the blessed silence he’d had before.

He didn’t say anything, hoping that she’d go away if she still thought he was asleep.

Footsteps made their way into the room. A hand crawled its way up his leg and over his arm.

He pushed an arm up and out of the blankets. Immediately, more light assaulted him. when had his mom opened the curtains? He was sure he’d closed them last night. He wouldn’t have left them just open, there was no way.

Midday sun, bright as balls. Before his mom even said it, he knew how late he’d slept.

“It’s one in the afternoon.” His mom’s voice was blessedly judgement free. “I think you should try to get up, sweetheart.”

He sniffled in response. Words were still beyond him at this point.

“Can you try? Just for me?”

She waited for a minute. He could feel her sat at the edge of his bed, her butt making a dent in the mattress and making his feet sink slightly.

Her presence was more comforting than he would ever admit to her. And yet, with no words yet to say, and no promise – even to himself – that he would be capable of getting up any time soon, she left, patting his calf as she did.

Bucky curled himself further up into a ball as she did, shame filling him as it did every morning. Afternoon.

He knew he should get up. His mom was right. There was no escaping it. He should face the world, try his best, seize the day, and all the other idioms that he had heard in the time since he’d been living here.

And yet he couldn’t.

That knowledge was at the forefront of his brain, _screaming_ at him. but his legs didn’t want to move, didn’t want to take him out to the floor, no matter what he told them. His chest was warm, just the right temperature, with fuzzy blankets tickling it, and it wanted him to stay.

His head was blessedly free of headaches, as well, which was something he had to take advantage of no matter what. The best way to take advantage of it, of course, was to do nothing and lie down.

Faintly, through the walls and floors, Bucky began to hear the sound of sizzling. His mom was cooking – lunch, probably, but if he got up it could double as breakfast.

Contemplating the idea of getting up just for that, he closed his eyes. Just for a minute, he told himself. Just while he was resting.

His eyes snapped open. What had he – he had had some kind of mini-dream in there just now, he was sure of it. Clearly not meaning to sleep didn’t mean anything if you did fall asleep anyway, and that was something that Bucky was very guilty of. Almost every day.

He rolled over. The sleep had messed up the equilibrium of the cosiness he’d had going before. Somehow his headache had returned, his blankets were too warm but at the same time, somehow too cold, and one of them had wrapped around his foot just slightly too tightly.

Jiggling it around in an attempt to be free, he realised just how stiff he was. How was it that he could be fine after a whole night’s sleep, but a ten minute nap somehow made him feel ten times worse?

Experimentally, he stretched out. How was _every single one_ of his muscles sore? From a _nap_? That shouldn’t be biologically possible.

He rolled around some more. Surely if he moved in this way, tucked his arm underneath him in this way, and stuck his leg out at that angle –

Nope, he couldn’t get comfortable.

Maybe this was the world’s way of telling him to get up, goddamnit.

Frustratedly, he sat up. His back protested, every part of it somehow having been lain down at the wrong angle. He rubbed at his eyes. There was plenty of sleep in there, he could feel it, but picking it all out seemed like too much effort. Plus his eyes hurt – which was strange, since he hadn’t really done anything with his eyes, other than rest them.

Oh well.

Experimentally, he rolled his shoulders around, and swung his arms.

Somehow he was still surprised when his left arm didn’t want to go as far as it should have done.

Trying his best to ignore that fact, to pretend like everything was as it should be – to pretend like his sleepy brain wasn’t his own worst enemy – he finally swung himself out of bed. He could hear the voices of his family downstairs – no doubt they would all have started eating without him, assuming that he wasn’t going to join them until much later, if at all.

He wanted to feel angry about that. He didn’t – but he didn’t know if that was because he didn’t blame them for assuming that, or because of how hard emotions had been for him recently.

Wait – neither of those were good.

Trying not to dwell on what his family were no doubt going to say when he came downstairs, he picked up the first pair of sweatpants he could find on the floor (aka the nearest ones, the ones he had shucked off right before getting into bed last night). They weren’t the cleanest, but nor were they the dirtiest – in other words, they’d do.

Trying to convince himself that it really didn’t matter if he wore a shirt or not, he pulled one out anyway. It was warm enough in the house, but the need to have something that would hide how lopsided his shoulders were was too overwhelming.

A hoodie would do just the job. Really it was because he was a little chilly from getting out of bed. It was 100% necessary.

The moment he opened his bedroom door was the moment the voices from downstairs got so much louder. He could almost hear the conversation going on.

He blocked it out anyway.

He began to walk down the stairs. Hoping to keep his getting up early secret, he tried to tread as lightly as he could, and –

The creaky stairs betrayed him. glaring down at it, as though the stair would have known in some cosmic way just how mad he was with it right now, he heard the conversation fully stop the moment the first creak sounded.

Did they think he couldn’t hear them, or something?

Well, maybe they did.

He did his best to resist stomping down the stairs, just to make a point. He couldn’t deny though, as he entered the kitchen at the bottom of the stairs, that they all looked a little too much like someone had said ‘act natural’ just before he reached them. (Actually, he wouldn’t put that past his mom.) They were sat round the table, all eating quietly and sensibly.

The day that Bucky believed that Becca would be capable of sitting at the table quietly would be the day that Bucky announced he was going to go live as a hermit in the Himalayas and become a goat farmer.

There was a place set for him.

That was what he noticed next, that they were all acting as though they had totally expected for this to happen. “Bucky, you’re up,” his mom said, as she looked up at him. “I’ll just go get yours – I left it warming in the oven, just in case.” She stood up and hurried over to the other side of the room.

Feeling a little like he was an expectant teenager again, Bucky went and sat down in his seat. His dad was sat opposite him. like nothing was going on, the man was eating his eggs and reading the paper like it was the morning instead of a late lunch. It was surreal – like a scene that he almost would have wished had happened before everything had torn his life to shreds.

His mom came back and put a plate in front of him. it steamed a little – a sign that perhaps it wasn’t as cold as it should be, given how long Bucky had left it to come down.

“So,” his mom said as she sat back down. “Becca, dear, what classes do you have on this afternoon?”

His sister made a pantomime of chewing her mouthful of food before answering. “Just my math class,” she said, pulling a face. “It’s so boring though. can’t I just skip? Just this once?”

His mom chuckled, as though Becca had been trying to make a joke. She began to launch off into a spiel that Becca must have heard at least a million times about why math was an important class that she couldn’t afford to skip, which must have been infuriating for Becca because she began arguing as though she thought if she tried hard enough mom and dad would let her not go…

But Bucky couldn’t focus on any of it. His eyes had landed on the plate of scrambled eggs in front of him, and no matter what he did, he couldn’t look away. He couldn’t eat it though, either.

It was practically going cold under his nose. It didn’t even smell bad – it could almost have made him hungry, if he’d properly been in the mood for it.

Somehow all of his energy had drained from him. It wasn’t a pleasant feeling. But nothing he could say to himself could make him pick up a fork and eat the food.

His stomach rumbled. Despite the loud argument going on around him, that seemed to be loud enough to take their attention away from that and to him, where it was least welcome.

“Bucky, dear? Do you not like your food?” His mom gave him the most earnest look he had ever seen on someone. It was torture, and only the lack of energy stopped him from curling in on himself again and hiding.

He swallowed. “No, I do like it,” he said. Like he was dreaming, his hand lifted, and picked up the fork that had been set out for him. Then his hand scooped up some egg, and put in his mouth, his lips somehow co-operating, even though he _wasn’t doing it_.

The eggs were sort of bland and rubbery in his mouth. They were easy enough to chew. Swallowing was the difficulty – it was a good job there was a glass of water already set out for him, because it might have been difficult without it.

Even with the disassociation going on, Bucky was sure that that wasn’t how the eggs were meant to taste. Judging by the fact that usually his mom made excellent food, he truly doubted that today was going to be the one day that suddenly all of that went to pot.

It honestly was more of a horrifying thought than his hand moving by itself had been though.

At his mom’s expectant look, he said, “it’s good.” There was still some food in there, he thought, but the relief on his mom’s face made it seem like there was nothing strange going on.

The weird mix of more guilt, and yet happiness because of making his mom happy, wrestled for a bit around his brain.

His mom’s death floated into the room, their rode trailing behind them. They were a familiar figure, one which had been a comforting figure to Bucky in his childhood in the same way that his own death had been.

This time he was compelled to keep his eyes on the dark figure. Trained on them from the moment they entered the room, he watched as they approached the table with no interruptions, settling behind his mom in their customary setting.

He swallowed heavily, trying not to panic. The eggs were still on his plate, waiting to be eaten, but suddenly the urge to eat that had been prompting him to eat the lunch was gone and his arms weighed a thousand pounds. He couldn’t have picked them up if he had tried.

It was at this moment that Bucky realised his own death was nowhere to be seen. They hadn’t been in his room, they hadn’t been in the kitchen, he hadn’t seen so much of a glimpse of them in the time he’d been awake.

He swallowed, the natural acceleration of his heartbeat coming over him. It was normal to panic without your death with you, really more of a reflex more than anything else.

If Bucky had been five years younger, he might have genuinely missed having his death around for a bit. If he wanted his death around him, it would have mattered. Determined to use this time wisely, even if he thought that the catalyst was probably a bad thing, he rose from his chair and said, “I’m going to go shower.” It came out as more of an announcement than he meant for it to.

His sister wrinkled her nose. “Good,” she said, “you need it.” She pushed at him a little towards the stairs.

Cracking a small grin, and ruffling at her hair a little, he began the arduous process of climbing the stairs. It was always so much worse than going downstairs, since it was so much more effort to make his legs lift so much higher.

Still, he managed to make it faster than he usually did, spurred on by the idea of his death following him up there.

Speeding through to the bathroom, Bucky locked the door behind him. That wouldn’t necessarily stop his death from getting in, of course, but keeping his family out would be just as important, for the purposes of this.

He hopped in the shower. The hot water was welcome, something that he couldn’t ignore, no matter what his brain wanted him to do.

Instinct told him to close in the shower. It had always been a good way for him to relax, and it had been part of his showering routine for as long as he could remember.

It was something he couldn’t bear to indulge in any more, though. Not when the idea of his death creeping up on him was there, making his dreams that little bit darker.

He got on with it as quickly as he could bear to. It was nice, really (although he kept his eyes off the greying water at the bottom of the shower tray – it wasn’t nice to be reminded of how much he had actually needed to take this shower).

By the time he was done actually getting clean, he couldn’t resist staying in for just a bit longer. The warmth was nice on his back, and there was rarely anything that relaxed him as much. Not when he could barely get comfortable, ever, anymore.

There was still no sign of his death – and he closed his eyes briefly, taking a deep lungful of steam.

Turning the shower off, he stepped out. Picking up a towel from the rack, he began drying himself, trying to get it as quickly as he could (the cold was biting).

The whole time he could see himself and his reflection in the mirror, and he didn’t think much of it.

When he was done, he turned around to get hold of his clothes – and was confronted with his death, standing silently in front of the door.

Bucky’s heart began to race uncontrollably. He placed a hand to it. “You scared me,” he said, more to himself than anything. His death neither said nor did anything, remaining floating in their spot like they were meant to be there.

He swallowed again. Now that it was here, he couldn’t take his eyes off of them.

But neither could he just not get dressed. He took another deep breath (the bathroom was beginning to cool, but it was still very steamy and it was mostly warm air that he was breathing – not the best for trying to be calm) and bent anyway to get his clothes, snapping up to watch his death as quickly as possible afterwards.

Thankfully, his death didn’t _do_ anything while Bucky was getting dressed. He wasn’t particularly bothered about his death ‘seeing’ him get dressed – not when that had been the same ever since he was little. No, it was just everything else that bothered him.

But now came the bigger problem. Now that Bucky had done everything that he had wanted to (he probably needed to brush his teeth, but he didn’t have the energy to do that anymore) he needed to leave.

He couldn’t do that with his death in the way, though.

They just stayed there, like the world’s worst guard dog, doing nothing but not doing anything overtly threatening either. Bucky didn’t trust it, not one bit – and every time he accidentally caught a glimpse of that void of blackness as his eyes moved, his heart jumped a little.

Technically an option would be to walk through his death. It wasn’t like he hadn’t done it before - but it was the most uncomfortable thing ever, and it really was a last resort. (Plus his mom would kick his ass if she found out that he’d done it again.)

So he had two options. Either he could wait for them to move, or he could walk around it. Really, out of the two he preferred the latter. Waiting could work, but it would take too long, and frankly he wanted to sit down.

He took another deep breath, deep enough that it almost made his ribcage hurt. Slipping past his death, round them and to the small gap in between them and the door, he could feel the heat being sapped out of the room by the mere presence of the death. It was chilling – literally – and Bucky wanted nothing more than to be away from it.

He opened the door as wide as he could, and escaped. He didn’t bother checking whether his death was following him – it wasn’t like he could do anything to stop it if they were.

By the time he got back to his room, he was done for the day. Already his headache, the one that meant ‘you’ve done and thought too much today, you should rest’, was beginning to form.

He flopped onto his bed.

“I don’t know how I’m meant to cope with this,” he whispered.

**

Steve woke up cold.

At least, that was the first thing that he registered. Shivering slightly, he pulled a blanket up over himself, tucking it in under his arms to keep out the draught.

Comfortable, and (almost) cosy, he settled in to sleep some more. It was a Saturday, he had no responsibilities to worry about, he could lie in for as long as he wanted…

The longer he lay there, the more aware he became of the bone-chilling chilliness that was invading his circle of warmth. Frowning, he reached one hand out to try to feel around. Had some of his blankets fallen off in the night? Was his comforter on wrong? He didn’t know.

There were no obvious faults that he could feel by hand.

Slowly but surely, he could feel his sleepiness falling away. Frowning, he blinked open sleep-filled eyes, yawning slightly. It wasn’t that he wasn’t used to being up this early, but he’d been very much looking forward to this lie in. All he wanted was to sleep in til 8 – and as he went to pick up his phone, he saw that it was only half 6.

Groaning, he sat up in bed, rubbing at one of his eyes. There was still nothing amiss that he could see. All of his layers were on his bed. His window was closed.

He was used to getting cold more easily than others – an inescapable part of being thin and small – but this was unusual for so late in spring. It shouldn’t be this cold, even in the mornings.

It was a mystery enough to tempt him out of bed. Pulling on the fluffy socks that he usually only needed in winter, and a woollen sweater that was far too big for him, he set out to investigate.

His first port of call was the bathroom. By this point his death had realised that something was amiss, appearing behind his shoulder in a comforting move. Even though his death was still colder than the room, than the apartment (just one of those mysteries about deaths that had yet to be solved – a death would always be colder than its surroundings), Steve knew that he would be able to rely on his death to help him out if there was something going on.

Really the mystery was solved far too easily. Before beginning any more looking around to see what was going on, Steve took a piss and went to wash his hands – and despite turning the tap to hot, the only water that came out was cold.

Clearly the problem here was the boiler.

Why that should have had such a massive impact overnight on the heating, Steve didn’t know, but what he did know was that this attic apartment was prone to getting colder than it should. His landlords had done their best to insulate it as best as they could, but as they had told him when he moved in, there was only so much they could do.

It was so _early_ though.

Surely it would be too early for him to go disturbing his landlords. If it was a weekday, Steve might not have hesitated, but given that it was the weekend? It was reasonable that they might not even be awake yet. He couldn’t disturb them just for that.

Knowing that he could last for another hour at least, Steve went back into the bedroom. Grabbing two of the blankets off of his bed, he wrapped them around himself, and then looped back through the living room and through to the kitchen.

Putting the kettle on, he figured that having a warm drink inside him would at least help things, if not solve them completely.

As he waited for the kettle to boil, he put a disappointed hand on the radiator behind him. The metal was cold, and cruel, and it should definitely have been warm by this point in the morning.

He found himself nearly falling asleep as he waited for the kettle to boil. It wasn’t intentional, he just sort of… accidentally allowed his head to get a little bit too far to the side, and his eyes closed of their own accord, and his blankets were soft, and warm enough, and…

The kettle began to whistle.

Eyes snapping open, Steve tried to clear the wool that had filled his brain in the 30 seconds it had taken his kettle to warm up.

Pouring his tea was a little precarious when Steve was still this sleepy, but it was a risk he was willing to take, for the good of the day.

When he had a warm cup in his hands, he made his way back into the bedroom. He thought about getting a head start on that painting he started the other day – but the idea of getting cold by getting rid of the blanket, or dripping paint all over one of his nice blankets? Both put him off.

And so back into bed he went, trying to conserve energy. In an attempt to distract himself from the inevitable sleep that would come if he didn’t at least try to get to sleep, he scrolled through twitter a bit, seeing what he had missed in the last few days.

It didn’t seem like the answer to that was much. He only followed around 50 people on there, most of them classmates. There were few celebrities which Steve was interested in seeing the twitter opinions of (when it was the case that often people’s worst sides came out on this site, Steve didn’t think that he would benefit in any way from having to see any of that.

The only interesting things were the tweets of his friend Sam. Not a month before, Sam had agreed to go on an exchange programme to Europe, and usually one of the highlights of Steve’s days was seeing what Sam had gotten up to this time. There were several selfies of him exploring Rome, as per usual – in the Vatican, this time, which Steve didn’t envy him having to wait so long to get into. Commenting a few times on them – mostly about whichever gormless tourist happened to be in the shot behind him – Steve continued to scroll.

There really didn’t seem to be anything else interesting going on. So, getting more desperate (he still had half an hour to wait – his eyes basically didn’t leave the clock) he switched over to Facebook. It was strange how there seemed to always be more going on on Facebook, despite the majority of Steve’s ‘friends’ on that site being the same age as him.

Still, it sort of made sense – he had many more friends on this site, having kept being friends with people from his middle school and high school on it. It looked like the majority of the people on there were also beginning to settle into fall – some of his mom’s friends were making jam, people were tidying their yards (why did that warrant any pictures?) and a few people were even getting ready for Halloween early, the weirdos. There was one picture that Steve appreciated seeing, and that was his mom’s baking. Even if he couldn’t eat it now, it was almost certain that he would get some the next time he went home, and he could practically taste it already.

“Damnit, why does time have to go so slowly?” Steve muttered to himself. He still had five minutes to go on his self-imposed timer, and the more time went on, the more chilled he got. Taking a risk, he stuck out one hand from his blanket fortress and placed his now-empty mug on his bedside cabinet.

Then he wrapped his blankets a little tighter, curled himself up a little tighter, and went to wait. It wasn’t really long to go now – so long as his landlords agreed to fix this soon, that was.

The moment the clock struck seven, Steve was already dialling the number on his phone. Putting it up to his ear, he prayed that they were going to pick up, that he wasn’t going to make them get out of bed just for him.

It rang, and rang.

“Hello?” It took Steve a moment to register that the voice on the other end sounded nothing like the older couple that Steve had spoken to before.

“Um – hi, I’m looking for Mr or Mrs Barnes?” He questioned.

“Oh! Sure, I’ll go get mom for you! Hold on!” The sound of a receiver being put down came next, and Steve was left waiting. Well, clearly he didn’t have to worry about having dialled the wrong number. As he waited, he tried to think whether he knew anything about the Barnes’ having any children. The conversations he’d had with them before had mostly been about the house itself, and not either of their personal lives, but Steve felt like that was something he would have remembered if they’d told him about it.

Then a muffled rustling sound came to him, and another voice. “Hello?” She sounded suspicious.

“Hi Mrs Barnes, it’s Steve? From the rental apartment?”

“Oh!” Mrs Barnes sounded like she was relaxing a little. “Steve, right. What can I do for you?”

“Um – my boiler seems to have stopped working? I don’t seem to have any hot water or heating?” Steve almost felt bad for having to tell her about it, even though two minutes ago he’d been desperate to get it fixed.

Mrs Barnes gasped. “Goodnesss, that’s terrible. Okay, I’ll let George know and he can come round and have a look at it. Shall we say in two hours?”

Steve winced. That didn’t seem soon enough, but he wouldnt’ exactly complain at such short notice. “Sure,” he said. “See you then.”

They said their goodbyes and hung up.

What was he meant to do for two hours? He looked despondently around his room. At that moment, his death materialised through the door. Perhaps it was Steve’s imagination, but it seemed like at that moment, the room became marginally colder in their presence.

No, he couldn’t hang around here and freeze. That was just stupid.

Sitting up straight, he pulled the nearest blanket over himself tight and stood up. Grabbing some pants out of his drawers, he put them on one handed (a tricky endeavour which involved a lot of hopping).

Picking up the satchel at the bottom of his bed, he threw off his satchel and set off out into the rest of his building. His death at his heels, he took the stairs as steadily as he could, with both hands holding onto the railings.

While he loved his attic apartment for its views, he did not love it for its stairs.

Reaching the bottom, he headed for the coffee shop at the end of his block. Usually he wouldn’t go there so early, but it would be warm, which in other words made it far superior to spending his time freezing in his apartment.

Pushing open the door, he was thankful to see that the majority of the people in there seemed to be commuters, which left most of the tables empty. Joining the end of the line, he settled into waiting for him to get the front.

When he did, he was confronted with the dilemma of whether to order tea or coffee. He didn’t often indulge in coffee – a heart issue would do that to you – but he’d already had tea this morning.

Deciding to take the plunge, he ordered himself a latte.

By the time it was made, the line had died down somewhat. It amused him to think that if he had just waited a minute or two more, he might not have had to wait so long in it.

Choosing a table that was in the corner, Steve hoped that if he hid away there they might not notice that he was going to be here for a good two hours.

Putting the tray holding his coffee down on the table first, he put his bag down beside his chair. Taking the time to take a sip first, he was glad to taste that the barista had listened to him when he said that he wanted soy milk. It wouldn’t have killed him to have regular, but given that he was going to have a man in his apartment to fix it soon, he didn’t want to get the shits any time soon.

Thankfully, he’d known that he already had a book in his bag from the other day. (Spending two hours on his phone was entirely possible, but it didn’t seem like the best idea after he’d just spent an hour doing just that.) pulling it out, he did his best to settle into it.

It was much easier now that he wasn’t freezing to death.

A few times while he was sat down, he went up and ordered more drinks. He didn’t get any more coffee after that time, but he did get some interesting teas, a muffin, and one hot chocolate just for the fun of it.

Having got through a good portion of his book (he often forgot that he should actually read the books that he didn’t have to read for class, since they ended up not going on his mental ‘things to do’ list, and it felt nice to allow himself to relax for a bit), he was still thankful when he got a text from Mr Barnes to say that he would nearly be there.

Smiling at the baristas as he left, Steve wondered if it was a bad sign that he went in there often enough that they recognised him.

Deciding not to idle outside – it wasn’t like Mr Barnes wouldn’t have a key of his own – Steve went to make his way back up the stairs. Of course, it helped that his other reason for not wanting to go up with Mr Barnes was that the man would have seen just how slowly he had to take the stairs. It wasn’t like Steve was secretive about his conditions, but he didn’t think that his landlord needed to know about them.

As he got further and further up the stairs, the colder it got. It made Steve wonder how he’d ever thought that there couldn’t be something odd going on in the apartment, since clearly the rest of the building wasn’t affected.

His death was right behind him, Steve knew. It made trying to identify exactly where the cold started sort of difficult – when there was a being made of coldness right behind you, it sort of skewed the data. Still, it was always good to know that there was someone behind you to catch you if you fell backwards off the stairs. (And yes, Steve knew that from personal experience. He had not been the most coordinated in high school.)

By the time he reached the top, he was pretty much out of breath completely. Yes, he had known about the long climb before he took the apartment on. No, he hadn’t really thought it through property.

As he opened the door, keys jangling loudly in the quiet corridor, Steve realised that he probably should have tidied up before they came over. Any tidiness that had been made had been lost in the time between his mom’s visit and now – and even if it had stuck around, there was still a big difference between the tidiness of your mom visiting, and the tidiness of impressing your landlord. There were even more cavasses and pieces of paper floating around – in the past few days he had had scraps of ideas come into his head, and they had needed just getting down in pencil in order to keep them alive.

Well, there was one best place to start. Steve scooped up as many of the scraps of paper as he could off the floor, and transported them over to his portfolio bag. It wasn’t the best place to put them, not really, but if he wanted to keep people from standing on them, he would have to keep them out of the way of feet.

There were so many – just so many little things that needed putting out of the way. Since when had he had so much _stuff_?

He barely had time to be done with his front room – which, to be fair, was going to be the first thing that Mr Barnes saw anyway – before he heard a key moving in the lock. Well, technically there must have been the sound of footsteps first, but Steve’s bum ear tended to be bad at picking out small, low sounds.

He turned around just in time to see Mr Barnes entering the room. Steve did his best to pretend like interacting with people for indeterminate amounts of time didn’t make him want to cry, and he smiled and held out a hand for him to shake. “Thank you for coming out so quickly, sir,” he said, knowing that gratitude was a must.

Mr Barnes shook his hand firmly. “You’re welcome,” he said, going to take his jacket off. It was an aborted movement – Steve could see the moment where he realised that even for people who weren’t as skinny as Steve, it was still too cold to not be layered up. “It _is_ nippy in here, isn’t it.”

Steve nodded. “I woke up so cold, it was unbelievable.”

Mr branes laughed. “I bet you did,” he said. Steve could see the way his eyes trailed over Steve’s art. It took everything in his power to not jump in and tell him not to look – mostly because he needed to be nice to this man so that he would fix his dodgy boiler.

“Shall we get to it then?” Mr Barnes asked, being the one to break the moment himself. For the first time Steve noticed the workman’s bag in his hands – clearly there was going to be some attempt at fixing right here, right now. Admittedly, that was definitely a good thing. Steve didn’t want to have to wait the inevitable few days that it would take to get a plumber out here. It wasn’t like he really had anywhere else to go, not unless he wanted to go live with his mom again.

Steve let Mr Barnes lead the way through into the bathroom, where the boiler and all of that stuff was. It wasn’t like the man didn’t know his way around already – he did own the apartment.

Shit – Steve had forgotten that he hadn’t tidied up his bedroom. Cursing the fact that you had to go through his bedroom in order to get into the bathroom, he tried to pretend like there was nothing unusual going on. He’d gotten so distracted cleaning the front room that he had entirely neglected to think about tidying anywhere else. There were still messy blankets everywhere, and his mug from earlier was still on the side.

Why was he incapable of keeping anywhere tidy?

At least the bathroom was reasonably tidy. It wasn’t like it was a place that was particularly easy to get messy – when all you did in there involved trying to be as clean as possible, it didn’t leave much leeway for making huge messes. There were perhaps a few too many empty shampoo bottles than Steve would like to admit to, but he did know that it was still within the realm of acceptable.

Opening up the linen closet, which happened to hold the boiler in it, Steve hovered anxiously behind Mr Barnes. It wasn’t like he understood any of what he was looking at – but somehow looking at it with him made it feel like he was at least giving emotional support. Their deaths were both by their sides, too – making the small bathroom, which usually only held one, almost feel cramped.

Well, Steve figured that this was as good a time as any to switch from his glasses to his contacts for the day. Might be a bit weird to do with Mr Barnes here, but he’d prefer to get them in so that he could begin to get on with painting. If he couldn’t actually be of any help here, he may as well go and get some art done.

“Hey could you pass me that?” Steve said to his death as he passed them.

They did so, and Steve took his glasses case off them. Putting them away, he went to get his contacts out of their solution.

It was as he was putting them in that he realised that he was being watched. Not maliciously, but that Mr Barnes was glancing at him every so often. Ignoring it, assuming that if he wanted something he would say so, Steve went about his business in getting ready for the day.

Many banging sounds began to come from the boiler. It sounded like Mr Barnes was making some kind of progress, and Steve was fine with that.

Finally finished with putting his contacts in, Steve turned back around. Mr Barnes and their deaths were still there, everyone mostly focused on getting the boiler fixed.

It was after a few minutes passed that Steve began to think that perhaps he should do something else, to pass the time. It wasn’t exactly riveting stuff, to be kept watching things that he didn’t understand, and perhaps Mr Barnes didn’t want an audience either.

Steve cleared his throat. “Would you like anything?”

Mr Barnes visibly twitched. He turned his head, just enough so that Steve could see his profile. “I – yes, if you have coffee, that would be nice.”

Nodding, Steve said, “sure, I can do coffee. How do you take it?”

Mr Barnes told him, and so Steve made his way out of the bathroom, pulling the door slightly closed behind him. Deciding to use his time wisely, he went to tidy up a little more, still embarrassed that he had forgotten to tidy up properly before Mr Barnes got here.

Putting his blankets on the bed properly, and bringing his mug back through with him as he went, Steve fought the urge to wrap one of them around him again. The lingering warmth that had stayed with him from the coffee shop had finally gone, and he was beginning to get properly cold again. And without his radiators working, there was very little he could do.

As he worked his way through to the kitchen, putting a few paintings back into place as he did, he noticed his death slink out of the bathroom and towards him. Ignoring their presence for now, he yawned, and went to put the kettle on.

It was now that he was beginning to feel the irritation that came with not getting enough sleep. His head hurt, and his eyelids felt heavy, and the more he thought about it, all he wanted to do was to climb back into his bed and go to sleep.

In an attempt to distract himself from this tempting thought, he went over to the window and tried looking at all the people down there, living their own lives. There were clearly people who had just come from the coffee show below, clutching hot cups of coffee in their hands, and there were people who looked like they were hurrying, long coats and scarves flapping behind them as they walked.

For all of them, there was a death with them. Behind them, or beside them, it didn’t matter. It was a comforting sight to see. Steve liked to think that secretly everyone was a bit close to their death. Even if they weren’t quite as familiar as he and his death were with one another, it was good to think that everyone had someone there for them when they needed it.

More sounds came from the bathroom, more ambiguous this time. They mixed with the sound of boiling water, and made quite an odd combination. Steve wasn’t sure whether to take this as a sign that he should assume that his boiler was entirely broken, or that it was being fixed.

The boiling of the kettle gave him an idea, entirely distracting him from what he was thinking about. Putting his hands on the kettle, he sighed as the heat from the kettle leeched into his hands and warmed them up. It was nice.

Eventually he had to let go when the kettle began to finish boiling. Pouring both himself and Mr Barnes a drink, he mentally prepared himself to go back in there and wait for things to be fixed. And to avoid the temptation to get back into bed.

Several hours later, Steve found himself practically surrounded by coffee mugs. He had erred on the side of staying in his bedroom while he waited for Mr Barnes to be done, but he wanted to stay close enough that he could check up on how things were going. Thankfully Mr Barnes hadn’t minded this too much – he seemed happy to just get on with things with Steve hovering around him.

He was sat on his bed, working on getting through one of his college books (he’d been so tempted to just read his book from earlier, but it already felt like so much of the day had been given over to wastage) when Mr Barnes came through the door into his bedroom, hands vaguely oily. “I think it should be fixed,” he said, looking over at the radiator. “It might not come back on straight away, but I think you should have heat soon.”

Steve breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you,” he said. “I know this wasn’t how you would have wanted to spend your Saturday.”

Mr Barnes chuckled. “Perhaps not, but I’m sure my wife will have appreciated the time to clean without me under her feet,” he said.

Steve showed him to the door (which, like before, felt weird). As they went back through the living room, Steve noticed Mr Barnes looking at the artwork on the floor again. Was that weird? It still felt too intimate, but then, not many people were so inspired by deaths like he was. Artwork depicting them had been far more common during the renaissance, where artists had begun to work on how deaths worked with religion. Given the way that that was no longer the case, it was strange to see someone who wanted to spend more time than necessary thinking about them in that way.

Still, Steve couldn’t extrapolate motive from someone he didn’t know. Mr Barnes could just have been curious. He hadn’t said anything about him, which Steve would have assumed he would have done if there had been some sort of issue going on.

And then he was alone again.

Finally, he was able to get on with what he wanted to do. He began to rearrange the room again, bring his easel back to the center of the room.

**

Perhaps Bucky didn’t enjoy feeling like he was twiddling his thumbs, but that very much felt like what he was being forced today.

Today had been slightly unusual as it was. When the phone had gone off, early in the morning, Bucky had already been awake. Not because of getting up early, but because of staying up late. He hadn’t meant to – it had just sort of happened, he hadn’t felt tired.

It had been a signal to him that he should probably at least try to sleep. It had been difficult, with the sounds of his dad going out after it, but he had managed a few fitful hours.

When he awoke – well, that was when things had gotten worse. For a start, his death had been sat in the chair in the corner of his room. They hadn’t been doing anything, nothing but sitting there – but that was enough.

Then he had realised that Saturdays were his therapy days. Sometimes he hated them, but other times he found himself sort of looking forward to them. Today was one of the latter. And naturally, his dad was still out. And he needed that ride.

Not that he was about to actually get out of bed. Not when his death was in the room.

He didn’t know how long he stayed there. He stared at his death. His death stared back at him.

The darkness under the cowl felt like it was sucking him in.

Sometimes he was sure that they knew exactly what they were doing. The thought only made the shivers making their way down his spine increase in intensity.

Even as he heard Becca’s footsteps make their way towards his room, he still couldn’t find it in him too look away from them. Just in case.

The door to his room opened with a soft creak. Even though Bucky knew it was coming, he still flinched.

“Bucky?” His sister’s voice was soft. She probably thought he was still asleep.

Reluctantly, he moved his head to look at her. “Yeah?” His voice was raspy. It caught him off guard.

“Mom says if you don’t get up soon you’ll miss your appointment.” Hesitant footsteps made their way further into his room. She came and sat on the edge of the bed, like she was scared to come any closer.

“Who’s going to take me?”

Becca shrugged. “Probably me. Mom’s started cleaning the kitchen, so she’ll probably be at least a few hours.”

“Where’s dad?”

“He’s gone to fix something at the rental place,” Becca explained.

Bucky had no idea what she was talking about. What rental place? He scoured his memory for trying to think of what she could mean, what he might have forgotten about, all the while staring at her blankly.

Then Becca began to look guilty. “Right – we did that while you were… away.”

Immediately Bucky felt ten times worse. “Oh.” That explained why he knew nothing of what she was talking about.

Becca coughed. “Yeah, so mom and dad thought it could be nice to get some extra income, so they bought an apartment for people to rent. The guy that lives there had some kind of emergency, so dad had to go fix it.” That explained the phone call.

“What’s the time?” Bucky asked, trying to sit up. While his sister was in the room he felt a little safer. Her death wasn’t here, and while she was around there was no way his death would come near him without her seeing it. He may as well take advantage of that.

“Half an hour before you need to leave,” Becca said. “It’s nearly one.”

“Right. Okay.” Bucky blinked. He hadn’t realised how sleepy he still was until he had to actually think about something. Then it all became very clear to him that he needed more sleep still. “Do you think mom’ll let me not go if I say I’m too tired?” He grinned sleepily at her, trying to make it clear that it was a joke.

Thankfully, Becca laughed. “I think you’d have to have a bucketful of luck,” she said. She squeezed his leg. “You really should get up,” she said, standing up herself.

Bucky saw her eyes flick over to where his death was. She said nothing, but he was sure that she knew what was going here, knew why he hadn’t gotten up already.

She left, clearly hoping that it would prompt him to get on with it.

To be fair, if he only had half an hour, he really did need to get up. Somehow, as he did so, he found his enthusiasm for the therapy fading. It was never good when he was tired. Not only did he not appreciate being told off for not sleeping enough, he usually wasn’t as good at answering questions when he could barely think.

He might have been joking about skipping because of tiredness, but if he thought he could get away with it he probably would have done.

Like always, he had to keep his eyes on his death. He was glad to see that they didn’t move at all while he actually took clothes out of his dresser.

It was with haste that he went about putting the clothes on. (It felt nice to put on clothes that were 100% clean for once.)

Thankfully, there was no movement from his death in this time.

Taking a deep breath, he left the room. It took far more courage than it should have done to turn his back on his death, but somehow it set his heart beating too fast in his chest.

The sound of Becca talking at his mom came from downstairs. It sounded like it was only really her speaking – there was very little evidence that his mom was saying anything at all.

For a moment, he thought about just not going downstairs. If he didn’t go down, he didn’t have to go to his appointment, and he could afford to go back to bed, or…

His stomach growled. Sighing, he gave in. He would have to eat, no matter how hard he tried not to. This was clearly a time where he was going to actually be able to stomach something, and he should take full advantage of that.

He began to walk down the stairs. It was surprisingly warm for the time of year, and it made Bucky’s hindbrain relax a little.

As he got downstairs, he yawned. The tiredness came at hm out of nowhere, sudden considering how awake he had been before. It wasn’t an unwelcome thing in itself, and –

He stopped in his tracks, freezing involuntarily. Becca’s death stood at the bottom of the stairs, having appeared out of nowhere in the time it took him to close his eyes and reopen them. Doing his best to keep his breathing even, he moved very carefully down the rest of the stairs, any semblance of his previous good mood gone.

Heart in his throat, Bucky tried to skirt round the death as he approached it. As he did so, their hood moved as they watched him. it was the only thing that made him nervous.

Once he was past them, he hurried on into the kitchen. His footsteps were too loud in the quiet dining room. Not when it was just him and the death.

“Hi sweetie,” his mom said, noticing him the moment he stepped into the kitchen. “I was wondering when you were going to get down here. You have –“ she checked her watch “-ten minutes left before you need to leave. I was going to have you eat while you’re here, but I think I’m going to just have to let you eat in the car.”

“Mom, you don’t need to –“ Bucky tried to protest, knowing that he could easily eat some snack foods in the time he had left and be done with it.

Before he could do anything, his mom had passed Becca a plate of food, along with whispered instructions to make him eat all of it. Bucky rolled his eyes. Did they really think he couldn’t hear them, when they were right in front of him?

“I still have time to…”

There was no point in saying anything right now, he realised. His mom had gone back to scrubbing one of the counters, and Becca had set the plate of food down and was scrolling on her phone. There was no one paying any attention to him – which, actually, wasn’t such a bad thing overall.

He debated leaving the room, and going and sitting in silence. The living room was usually a nice place to be – it got a lot of sun, and Bucky had always enjoyed spending a lot of time in there.

But there were deaths out there. He had no idea where any of them were right now, and he had very little interest in going near any of them. If he was in here, he would be safe.

Leaning a hip against the counter, he tried to look as casual as he wanted to feel. It was difficult, but he thought that he at least looked about as casual as Becca did.

Getting out his phone, he did his best to do the same as Becca, as he might have done before.

What did he care for the opinions of people that he had barely spoken to in years, though? That was what the entirety of his Facebook feed consisted of. It barely interested him, and he found that his eyes were glazing over.

Instead, his thoughts went to what was going to happen later. His mixed thoughts about his therapy sessions came back to haunt him at odd times, but they were most common whenever he was on the verge of going to one of them. It wasn’t ideal, not really, but it at least was one thing about his brain that made sense.

He barely took in any of the things that he was seeing on the screen in front of him. he kept scrolling, his thumb on autopilot, but he paid no attention to any of it.

Instead, his mind was filled with the kinds of things that his therapist liked to ask him. the kinds of things that he had to mentally prepare himself for. When he tried to think of what the answers might be in advance, but always found it difficult to articulate in real life.

It made his life much more difficult.

“Come on, Bucky.”

His head snapped up. Becca was stood next to him in the doorway. She had a concerned look on her face. “What?”

“I – never mind.” She shook her head. “We need to go.”

She walked off without him, leaving him slightly confused. At least, he was confused for a bit. When he saw his mom smiling sadly at him as she turned around, he realised what must have happened. His zoning out didn’t happen very often, but when it did it ended up leaving everyone confused.

Trying to ignore the fact that he must have just been stood there while Becca tried to talk to him, he followed his sister out of the house and to the car.

Her death was between them. Their dark cloak was a striking patch of black in amongst the bright colors of the front yard and their neighbourhood, really making their mark.

Becca was already in the car by the time Bucky got out there.

It was only when Bucky went to get into the car too that he realised that both of their deaths were just hanging outside the car, not coming in. That was unusual – if there was space, usually a death would want to be in the car with their human.

Bucky didn’t know if that made him feel more or less uncomfortable.

Becca set off without saying anything.

Bucky didn’t know what to say. Instead he settled for watching the streets passing him by as they drove further into town. Not that he really paid that much attention to any of what he could see, but to see people passing them by doing their own things was nice.

Even seeing their deaths behind them only gave him a small moment of panic. It was never so bad when he knew they were other people’s deaths. When he knew they couldn’t hurt him, he could relax. The image of them was still enough to get that small amount of fear into him.

“So how did you sleep?” Becca’s voice was quiet.

Bucky turned to look at her. They were stopped at a red light, and yet Becca stayed looking at the road.

“… I slept okay,” Bucky said, slightly confused as to why she was choosing now to ask that. Not that he would have admitted to sleeping badly. That tended to just make her worry more, and that was the last thing he wanted.

Becca nodded. The light turned green, and they set off again. She didn’t say anything more.

This was something Bucky had hated ever since he had got back. Becca was naturally chatty. They had never had any problems finding something to talk about before. Ever since he got back though? Yeah, it had become a real struggle.

It was just another thing for him to feel bad about.

They arrived at the therapist’s office quickly. Or, it felt quickly. It could have been any amount of time, really. it was so hard to tell.

“I’ll wait for you, yeah?” Becca said as she parked.

Bucky smiled a little. “Yeah,” he said. She always did wait whenever she was the one to take him. It was something he appreciated, even if it probably wasn’t necessary any more. There was always the chance that he would need to leave early, and after the incident that they dind’t like to talk about, she stayed.

He got out of the car. The first thing that he saw was their deaths, chilling on the top of the car. He swallowed, that small amount of panic speeding his breathing up. Glaring at them slightly, just to let his death know that he wasn’t welcome, he turned tail and fled in the direction of the door.

Despite the reasoning for him going here, it was somehow still a place that Bucky felt comfortable. He couldn’t explain it, nor could he say why it had even come about in the first place. Still, even as he saw his death float into the room out of the corner of his eye, he only panicked a little.

He gave his name to the receptionist. By this point he probably didn’t actually need to, since she almost certainly knew who he was by now. It still felt like the right thing to do though. like he was somewhere normal.

Like every week, she directed him to ‘have a seat’ with a smile. Even though she must have known that he wouldn’t. Even though this place didn’t make him anxious in the way that some places did, it still filled him with a strange sort of energy. It compelled him to pace, and there hadn’t been a single meeting he’d had where he’d been able to actually make use of the calmness of the place.

By contrast, his death was still. The way he liked it.

Even the appearance of the receptionist’s death wasn’t enough to spoil things for Bucky. (Even if he still flinched a little when he noticed it.)

Things seemed to be running late, he noticed. It was only when he checked the time that he saw that the time for his appointment had already been and gone.

That was fine, he told himself, pausing in his pacing. They were allowed to run over. There were important things at work here. If things didn’t go to plan, it was no big deal.

It wasn’t like he had anywhere to be after this.

The receptionist paid him no mind. She was doing… something on her computer, the rhythmic tapping of her acrylic nails on the keyboard oddly soothing.

Soon enough, he heard voices making their way down the corridor. His therapist, with someone who he could only assume was another patient, were there, coming though the door.

He tried to not react too much to the presence of more deaths in the room. Two was okay, but four could be a little much to handle, a few too many to keep track of.

“It was good to see you, Kelly,” his therapist said, smiling at the woman who had come out with her.

The woman smiled back. It didn’t quite reach her eyes. She went over to the reception desk, and went about booking her next session.

Then his therapist noticed him. “Hey there Bucky!” She said cheerfully, ramping up her energy from how she had been before. That made sense.

Bucky smiled back. “Hi.”

“Come on in.” She walked back over to the door she had just come out of, and held it open for him. He walked through it, knowing this place well enough by now to know where to go. He heard the door close behind him.

Reaching the right door, he stopped, knowing that he should wait for his therapist to go in first. It was only polite.

“You know you’re allowed to go in without me, right?” She reached past him and opened the door anyway. By now she knew that he wouldn’t, but the routine was important.

They entered the room together. His therapist went to sit behind her desk, Bucky sitting in his seat in front of it. There was a lot of sunlight coming through the window. It was warm, and allowed Bucky to forget for a moment that there were two deaths in the room.

“How have you been this week, Bucky?” His therapist started off. She smiled at him like it was a normal time.

Bucky began the fiddling with his hands that always happened. “I’m good,” he said.

Michelle shook her head. “Okay, but how are you really?” She asked.

Bucky shrugged. “I’m good,” he repeated.

“How have you been this week? Any luck in doing the breathing exercised I suggested?” She tried continuing the conversation.

Right. He was meant to be working on feeling better around his death in a way that wasn’t just avoiding it. “Um – no, not really.”

Michelle raised her eyebrows. “No, it hasn’t worked, or no, you haven’t tried it?”

Damnit, she saw through his bluff. He shuffled around a little more. “I just…” he shrugged. “Like I said, I just don’t like the idea of it.”

“And why is that?” Michelle asked, picking up her pen.

Bucky’s fingers found the hem of his shirt, beginning to fiddle with it. “Because it would mean going near them,” Bucky muttered, keeping his eyes down.

This was the part that he hated having to admit to. He heard Michelle tapping her pen against the table. “But don’t you think that it would be a good idea to at least try that?” Her question was fair, but that didn’t mean that he had to be happy about it.

He paused – before shaking his head. “Nope.” He sounded petulant as hell, but he didn’t even care.

Michelle sighed. It was a familiar sigh – one which Bucky had heard a lot during the time he had spent in this very office. It wasn’t judgemental, nothing like that. Just an exasperated one – one which spoke of the amount of frustration she had about him and his answers.

She never got mad at him though. “I know you feel like you can’t,” she said patiently. “But I think it would be good for you to at least spend more time around your death.”

Bucky wrinkled his nose. It already felt like he spent enough time around his death. He didn’t need any more, not when it would mean more panicking. “I disagree,” he said.

Michelle sat back in her seat. “Your fear of your death,” she said, eyes flicking up to her own. “Are you ever going to tell anyone where it came from?”

Immediately, Bucky shook his head.

“Okay,” she continued, beginning to sound a little like she was begging. “You don’t even have to tell me. But it can’t be good for you to continue to keep all of this inside.”

She had a point there. He had to admit that. But… “I can’t,” he said. “Not when I can’t…” Can’t make the words come out of his mouth. Not even to talk about how they wouldn’t come out of his mouth. He couldn’t make it happen.

It didn’t seem to surprise Michelle at all. “Not even with your family?”

Another head shake.

“Why do you think you can’t talk about it, then?”

Now that was a question that was almost more difficult to answer than the one before it. Bucky continued to stare. He didn’t know what to make of that.

How to answer something that he didn’t know the answer to?

He ended up continuing to be mute for a few minutes. Part of him was contemplating the question. Another part of him was thinking about the fact that he couldn’t answer it. Wondering if he should have just let the words come out, just to please people. Just to make them happy, so that they wouldn’t want to ask about it anymore.

For once, Michelle stayed quiet. Let him think.

“Don’t you know enough about me from the news coverage?” It was the same question he had asked during their first meeting.

Ever since that first one, where they had established who he was and why he needed therapy, they had somewhat been going in circles. It had been months; he knew that. Most of their sessions had gone like this. The one thing of significance, the one which had made him need the therapy in the first place. The one that he refused to talk about. It sort of made him feel like he was wasting his parents’ money, sometimes. They were the ones that insisted on it in the first place, though.

Michelle knew all of this as much as he did. It was a shared knowledge, a kind of status quo between them.

It had never stopped her form trying to do her job, though. Every session had still included her trying to bring the topic up, to the best of her ability.

“I want to know your side of the story.” It was the same answer she had given him the first time he had asked the question.

It was honestly a fair answer. But not one that he appreciated receiving. “I don’t’ think that it could give you any more information than you already have from that.” As far as he was concerned, it was true. The important things, anyway, were the ones that the public had been told. It barely mattered what he thought in addition to all of that.

He didn’t want to have the pressure of knowing that his secret was out there. The secret of what he had had to go through.

“I don’t want people to know,” he said, hanging his head. “I can’t…”

This was probably the most information he had volunteered in any of their sessions.

He knew it, and Michelle knew it.

**

Somehow Bucky always found that he felt worse about his problems after a therapy session. Not in the same way, of course.

But to be reminded of how not normal he was could make it even more difficult to feel okay. To be reminded that for most people, having their death around was a good thing. It was embraced, and celebrated. And he could never connect with that.

His eyes fell on his laptop. It was rarely used any more, not when there was nothing he wanted to do on it. But it was useful for googling things that he didn’t want to use his phone for.

He was alone in his room. His death was elsewhere. If he did it now, nobody would have to know.

Pulling it out, he noticed how dusty it was. Taking a second to wipe some of it away, he opened it up. Thankfully there was still some charge in it, and as soon as it had booted up, the first thing he did was open up chrome.

He took one furtive look up at his door. Nobody was going to interrupt him, not right now.

‘Is it possible to separate yourself from your death?’

It felt strange to type. It was the sort of question that should only be asked in theory, he knew.

The first few results seemed to be people who were asking it on questions sites, like Quora. The answers given read like ‘Yes, it is possible. A friend of my cousin’s neighbour did it once, and they were totally fine. My cousin said that she sometimes sees them around and they never have their death near them.’

Of course, naturally the next result said ‘it is possible, but you’ll die if you do.’

Neither of these were particularly helpful, and Bucky exited them with disgust.

He set his laptop aside for a minute. The longer he spent looking at results about his question, the worse he felt. He couldn’t explain why, either. It just seemed like such a taboo thing, something that children were told off for talking about, and something which after that point you were told not to think about.

It wasn’t like he didn’t know the usual rules. You couldn’t get more than a few metres away from your death without feeling sick, and you needed them with you as often as possible, and they were good for you, overall.

One of the things that Bucky had seen before he closed the tab was a news article from a few years ago. It had only been the title that he saw, but it had read ‘scientists shut down after plans for experiments on men and their deaths scrapped’. Even science couldn’t get close enough to it to allow for testing.

Privately, Bucky thought that he would have liked to be part of that testing.

Taking a deep breath, he opened the tab back up. He didn’t click on the news article – mostly because it wasn’t going to be of any actual use – but he did see something else that looked like it might actually be relevant.

‘Ten ways my death annoys me’

Finally, he thought. Someone else that thought the same way that he did.

‘I can’t get a moment alone to have sex!’

‘Why do they have to be so ominous all the time?’

‘Why can’t I change their clothes? Sometimes black just doesn’t go with my outfits!’

Oh. Maybe not.

Bucky clicked out of that site too, beginning to feel more and more frustrated.

Was he really the only one that felt like this?

‘I tried staying away from my death for a week’

Now that looked promising. Bucky clicked on it, hoping that for once it would actually hold some semblance of reality in it.

‘So as you guys know, I like to do experiments with my death. We’ve done lots of things together (you should check out my other blog posts about it), but this one was our wildest one yet.

And, before any of you say anything, yes, my death is fine with everything we do, we always discuss it beforehand. And no, you probably shouldn’t try to replicate any of it. Me and my death have a really special thing going on, and I don’t think that most people would be capable of this.’

There was some video footage inserted, seemingly from the guy’s YouTube channel. Bucky ignored it for now – the thumbnail involving the guy’s death was enough to scare him off.

‘day 1

So the week started off pretty easily. Me and my death are pretty used to staying away from each other a lot, so from the start it didn’t feel too difficult, even if my instincts went against it as often as possible.

As you can see in the video, though, I had to lapse a few times. No matter how many times I try to tell my death that the point of the challenge is to stay away from each other, there’s something about their very nature that makes deaths want to stay near us. It’s not something you can just override – even if that is the whole point of my channel!

I tried to time the amount that I actually spent without my death. It was hard to say for sure, but I think I managed to go only about half an hour in total around my death.

Day 2

I thought that I’d be able to go the entire week, but I realised when I woke up on the second day that my death had definitely been in the room while I slept. There’s not really anything I can do about that, so I decided that I would only count the times when I’m awake. I-’

Bucky skimmed over the rest of the article. It was sort of interesting to see, but it didn’t quite answer his question. It looked like this guy had a weird kind of bond with his death that allowed him to be away from his death for unusual amounts of time. That wasn’t going to be exactly something he could replicate. Not with his low tolerance for his death in the first place.

He ran a hand through his hair. None of this was going to work for him. Nothing seemed useful, nothing actually answered his question.

He still didn’t know if there was anything you could do to separate yourself from your death. Because that would really make things a lot easier for him.

The only other result he could see was one which confirmed the fact for him that anyone who wanted to get rid of their death was going to be regarded as mentally ill. It was a stark reminder of why he needed to make sure nobody else knew he was doing this. It was dangerous.

Trying once more, he modified his search to be worded a little more directly.

Most of the results that came up were the same. He hovered over them, unwilling to click on any of the ones which looked like they were entirely fabricated.

Scrolling down, he noticed one link that took him to jstor. Well, that was one more article than he’d seen before.

It speared to be an article from a medical journal. It wasn’t particularly long (although probably not worth the hassle that Bucky had to go to in order to access it in the first place), and that made Bucky sure that he was going to be able to actually read it, if it seemed useful.

‘The Effect of Extended Separation between Humans and their Deaths: A Clinical Trial and Study’

The title itself seemed promising.

Bucky read it quickly, all five pages.

‘In conclusion, the average amount of time a human can stand to be separated from their death is five hours, particularly if they are kept from food at the same time. Although there were attempts made to test the effects of distance on the subjects, it proved to be too difficult to control the deaths after this point. It –‘

Bucky stopped reading when the shivering got too bad.

It hadn’t answered his questions at all, but it had reminded him of the reasons he couldn’t stand to be near his death.

Without bothering to close the browser or even turn the laptop off properly, Bucky simply closed it and put it back on his desk. That was enough for today.

Feeling slightly sick, he lay down on his bed. That had been a bad idea.

But the kernel of an idea that had sparked this remined. It hadn’t deterred him in the slightest. If anything, it had only reminded him of just how much he wanted to be free from this.

If he didn’t have a death of his own, then it wouldn’t bother him to be around other people’s deaths, he thought. Because then he would have no reason to be scared.

**

Steve yawned. He was meant to be doing this still life drawing for class, but it was just boring him. Why did he have to take this class again? It wasn’t like he was under any illusions that he was doing to become a great drawer any time soon, instead of a painter.

Okay, so maybe his preoccupation came more from his own tiredness, rather than anything to do with the subject matter in hand. Honestly by now nude models didn’t even bother him – being a postgraduate student who had been doing this for years would do that to you – and perhaps that only added to his boredom.

He put his pencil down for a moment and yawned again, rubbing at his eyes. They were heavy – he’d stayed up too late last night trying desperately to finish another painting. He didn’t know what it was that had set him on such a manic path, but he just hadn’t been able to find the way that his subconscious seemed to want him to find for the end of this painting. It was slowly beginning to prove too difficult – no matter how many times he tried, or how many new papers and canvases got wasted because he didn’t know where he wanted it to go, he just wasn’t satisfied.

Guiltily, he realised he was wasting class time by even thinking about it. He should be focussing on the work that he was meant to be doing.

Everyone else in the class was hard at work. Steve didn’t talk to them very much, but he was pretty sure that they were mostly drawers, used to doing this sort of thing.

That only made things more irritating for him.

He picked his pencil back up. It felt awkward in his hands – strange, since he used pencils and pens often enough, and it wasn’t like he was a total stranger to drawing. It just wasn’t his favourite.

Perhaps it just needed sharpening to make it feel right. Standing up, he went to take it to where the bin was.

Maybe it was just the break from staring at his paper that made him feel better, but as he stood over that bin, filled with pencil shavings and general art waste, he felt better than he had done – lighter, somehow.

Or perhaps it was just from not being cramped in one seat for several hours while they did this stupid project.

Steve looked up at the clock. There were only 15 minutes left in this session – they were due to do this again in two days’ time. It wasn’t something that he looked forward to, knowing that he’d have to do this again soon, but it _was_ good to know that he didn’t have to do this for much longer.

Pencil sharp again, Steve went to sit back down, doing his best to stretch as much as he could while he did. It was comforting, and his shoulders appreciated it.

With renewed vigour, Steve did his best to use the rest of the time in the class wisely. They did need to get this practice one done to a good standard if they wanted to be able to be allowed to do their big final project in this class, and it wouldn’t do to actually fail this one. Not if he wanted to graduate any time soon.

The bell rang, and Steve found himself packing his things up practically before he even knew what he was doing.

Ordinarily he might have stayed around longer to make sure he was packing things up properly. But this time it wasn’t even because he wanted to be gone – it was because he really needed to get to his next class.

He ended up being the first person out the door. He didn’t have to go too far – only down the stairs and along a bit – but he still didn’t want to be late.

Being a TA hadn’t been his first idea for a good job to have while dealing with college. But it was better than nothing – and it made for pretty easy hours.

For the most part, turning up to the lectures was the easy thing, even if he found that sometimes he was late because of days like these.

He entered the room just as the professor was starting his lecture. Keeping his cool, pretending like everything was cool, he made his way to the first seat that was available, one in the second row on the end. It didn’t bother him too much to sit in the first few rows, not like it seemed to do with the undergrads – although that was probably because he wasn’t being graded on this.

The lecture in question was something that he knew very well, but was perhaps something that he would end up getting students emailing him about later.

It was something he hadn’t thought about before he took on the job – the fact that he seemed so approachable to these undergrads. The fact that he legitimately looked younger than some of them probably helped – they seemed to have no fear in talking to him. Not that that was a bad thing, but sometimes he thought that the professor didn’t quite know how many emails he got inundated with which should probably have gone through to him.

He listened to the girl next to him um and ah throughout the entire lecture. If it weren’t for the fact that it was entirely silent but for the sound of the professor talking, he might have said something, might have tried to help. But it probably would have been more counterproductive than anything else, and he refrained.

By the end of the lecture, Steve felt much more relaxed than he had. With his death floating above him, away from the crowds (like most of the deaths in the room, choosing to go upwards when there wasn’t room for them), he made his way out and to his office. It was one of the perks of this class – his office hours were right after the lecture, and it made it somewhat easier to deal with any questions he was going to get about it. When the information was fresh in both of their minds, it made it so much easier to know what they were meant to be talking about.

Unlocking his office, which was really only a little way down the corridor, he put his bag down inside. He technically shared the office with another TA, but they showed up so rarely that it mostly felt like it was his office and his alone.

He knew he was going to probably only have a few minutes of peace. There was never much time in between the lecture and them arriving, and he needed to make the most of his time.

Making sure to turn on his computer (it would take ages to do so, so it was best to get it started sooner rather than later), he sat and waited for things to happen.

He only had time to scroll through a few posts on twitter before there was a knock on the door.

His back was still sore from earlier, and so he called out, “come in!”

The door cracked open. A face peered around the opening, looking sheepish. “Hi,” she said. “I’m – I’m looking for Steve Rogers?” It was the girl he had spent the past few hours sitting next to.

He smiled at her. “That’s me,” he said, spinning around in his chair to face her properly. “How can I help?”

She looked slightly surprised. That wasn’t exactly unusual – despite being introduced at the start of the semester to the class, plenty of them promptly forgot who he was. Taking a few tentative steps into the room, she shut the door behind her.

“Um – I just didn’t get today’s lecture? Like, it just made no sense to me.” As she said this, she began to look even more embarrassed, and clutched her bag strap tighter.

Trying not to sigh, to keep the frustration on the inside, Steve smiled. “Sure, I can explain it,” he said, gesturing at the open seat next to him. “What’s your name?”

“Becca Barnes.”

They sat there for a while while Steve explained the concepts from the lecture to her. In a way that surprised Steve a little, he found that she was attentive, and it seemed that her lack of understanding was more to do with not being an art major, instead of a lack of attention. It was refreshing to find that there were people in the lectures that were actually interested in what was going on in the class.

There was nobody else who ended up coming. That was probably a good thing, overall, since it ended up taking much longer than Steve would have guessed for them to go through everything thoroughly.

“Thank you, Steve,” Becca said as they were wrapping up. “I feel like you’re a much better explainer than Professor Kim. Why can’t you teach the class again?”

Steve laughed. “I promise I don’t know as much as him,” he said, beginning to put his own things away too. With nobody here, and with only five minutes left to go, he didn’t feel like there would be any point in sticking around. Not when he could be getting on with other things that would be more productive. “You’re better off going to him if you still don’t get things, I think.”

Becca shook her head. “I don’t,” she said. “You’ve done more just now to make me understand the class than the last five lectures combined.”

Their deaths floated closer, seeming to understand that things were finishing up. They had stayed at the other side of the room while they talked. Even Steve’s death, which had had a lot of experience with art things, never showed that much interest in his teaching.

As Steve tried to fit his laptop in his bag, he found that there were too many things smooshed in the bottom of it to properly get everything in there. “Why does this always happen?” He asked himself (and the bag), shaking his head.

Becca laughed. “The eternal struggle,” she said.

Giving up on trying to get everything out of the way, Steve went ahead and pulled some of it out. Honestly he could have done with a clear out weeks ago - so much of it was his scraps that were covered in doodles, nothing truly of value.

He knew that Becca was watching him as he did so, and that was fine.

Although, as he finally shoved his laptop in, he realised that she was looking more at the doodles than anything else. That was less okay – when none of this was meant to see the light of day, never mind anyone else’s eyes.

He did his best to subtle sweep them in the direction of the trashcan. “I don’t even know why I still have these around,” he said, chuckling casually.

Becca squinted at them. “They’re so good…” she said, seeming to reach for one of them automatically. Steve didn’t stop her.

His heart began to pound like he’d tried to run somewhere. Why did this make him so nervous? Why hadn’t he stopped her from looking at them?

She seemed almost entranced. “I’ve never seen anything like this…” she whispered to herself. Then she looked up at him. “I didn’t know you drew,” she said, as though this was some huge revelation for her.

Steve nodded. “Yeah, I specialise more in than than I do art history,” he said. “But my undergrad minor was in art history, so it was pretty easy for me to take on the TA job.”

Becca blinked. “Wow…” she said. The paper that she was holding was very clearly a drawing of one of his plans for his big death piece. It made him more and more worried that things were about to take a weird turn, and he tugged it gently out of her hands.

“Never mind any of this garbage,” he said lightly, trying to move the topic on. “I’m sure you have other classes to be getting on with.”

Becca seemed to shake herself out of her mini-trance. “No, actually,” she said, coming back to herself. “This is my last class of the day, I get to go home after this.”

“You’re lucky,” Steve said. “I have to go to studio time now. If I don’t work on my pieces for other classes, I’ll get in a lot of trouble.” He left out the part where studio time was one of his favourite things because it meant he got to do what he wanted without needing to worry about what else he should be doing.

Becca blinked. “Right,” she said, making no move to leave the room.

It would be up to Steve to subtly hint that, then. Leaving some of the mess that was still on his desk, he turned off his computer and stood up. It could do to be left for another day – nobody but him would touch any of it, so he wasn’t really in too much danger by leaving it here.

He went to the door and opened it. Weirdly, their deaths were the first ones to leave, but this seemed to be the catalyst that Becca needed to leave herself. Exiting before Steve did, she turned around just as she was going out the door and said, “thank you.” It was a small gesture, but a very genuine and welcome one. It wasn’t often that Steve was recognised for the time that he willingly gave up for the students, and it was nice to see.

They left the room in comfortable silence, parting ways afterwards. Steve got the feeling that Becca would probably prove to be a frequent participant in his office hours, and he found himself looking forward to it.

He didn’t miss the way that she looked at her death as she left though. Perhaps it was just her seeing his drawings, but it had seemed to him like it went a little deeper than that.

It was good, to think that perhaps his attempts at portraying deaths in a different light were working.

**

Bucky was already awake when the drama happened.

It was one of the rare days that he decided to spend in the sunroom – it was a big glass conservatory, which got nice and warm just from the sun. Even as fall approached, it still got plenty warm, and he liked to soak up as much of it as he could.

Even better, the warmth meant that his death stayed well away. Even though Bucky knew that it wasn’t normal for your death to want to stay away from warmth – it wasn’t like they could feel anything – he still appreciated having the time to himself.

He was nearly asleep. Eyes closing, he was entirely comfortable.

Initially the sound of footsteps didn’t bother him that much. There were very few problems that his family would bother him about these days. It was incredibly unlikely that they would need to –

“Bucky!”

His mom burst into the room. “What is this?” She sounded somewhere in between angry and upset.

Bucky’s eyes didn’t want to open. Clearly, he had been more sleepy than he realised, he thought. Still, he did his best to try, and he ended up blearily opening them to see his mom stood in front of him. “Yeah? What?” His voice came out raspier than he expected.

He watched her gulp. “Rebecca just showed me your laptop.” She was almost hissing her words, like she couldn’t believe what she was saying.

It was then that Bucky noticed the fact that she was holding his laptop. He frowned. “What are you doing with that?” His brain didn’t want to compute what was going on, or why his family were mad at him.

She waved it at him a little, before putting it down. “You-“

Her words were cut off by Becca running into the room, looking harried. “I didn’t mean to,” she cried, looking wildly between the two of them.

It was at this moment that Bucky realised that he should probably sit up. This whole time he had stayed laying down, the fact that he had been napping keeping him sleepy. That was hard to be with all this going on around him.

Peeling the blanket off of his legs, he sat up. “What’s going on?” He asked.

His mom huffed at him. “Your sister showed me what you’ve been searching for,” she said. “I don’t – I just don’t see why you would feel the need to even think about something like that?”

At these words, his sister started to look even more guilty. “I didn’t mean to show her buck,” she said, wringing her hands. “I just – I wanted to borrow your laptop, and it opened straight onto it, and – I was so surprised, and I didn’t know what to do, and mom was right there –“

Bucky blinked, slow and hard. What had he even been searching for that would make his family freak out so much? His brain was full of cotton wool, slowing all his processes down to a crawl.

He had vague memories of searching for something intently after his last therapy session. That much he was sure of. The memories, though? They were behind a wall, one which was only just see though. He knew they were there, but he had been so worried at the time, and he was so sleepy now. There just seemed to be no way of accessing them.

Looking up at his mom, he did his best to communicate that he barely knew what was going on with his eyes.

It seemed to work.

“You want to – to separate yourself from your death!” She hissed. Oh. Right. That. “You know how dangerous that could be. Why would you even consider that?”

Now that she had reminded him, Bucky remembered doing that all too clearly.

Even being reminded of it now, he thought that it sounded like a good solution.

One of their deaths floated into the room. Bucky flinched. Yup, if he could do away with his own he’d be much happier.

But how to get that across to his mom?

She was still stood there, looking unhappy. He didn’t want her to be unhappy. “I – I just –“ he looked at Becca, mostly to try for help.

Becca smiled at him. “I think what Bucky means is that he was just curious,” she said, turning to their mom with a genial smile.

No. No, that wasn’t is. He shook his head, getting their attention. “No,” he said, repeating that one word that had been going round his head. He could feel the frustration rising inside him. It made it difficult to breath, like his chest was being constricted. It wasn’t exactly a comfortable feeling. “No, I just – my death is such a burden. All of our deaths are.”

The faces of both his mom and sister began to look shocked.

He continued – mostly rambling. “I don’t want them around,” he said, the frustration continuing to swell inside him like a fetid balloon. “Why do any of us? I mean, all they do is hang around, not doing anything, until we die and they take us away! What’s the point in any of it?”

Energy that he didn’t know he had filled him. He stood up, slamming the cushion that he had been holding onto the couch. “I don’t want this anymore,” he said. He stormed out of the room.

Naturally, the first thing that he ran into was his own death. They were floating just outside of the room – almost like they had been listening in on what was going on. “Leave me alone,” Bucky growled, speaking directly to his death for the first time in months.

They said nothing. They never did.

For once, he pushed through the fear that came from seeing his death. It was still there, it wasn’t like he’d suddenly gotten over it, but somehow it didn’t bother him so much in the moment.

His mom caught his shoulder. He turned around. When did they catch up to him?

“Do you know how serious this is?” She looked more anxious than angry any more. “I just –“ Seeming to give up, she pulled him in for a hug.

Bucky wrapped his arms around her slowly. He hadn’t been a big fan of physical contact for a lot of the time he had been home, but this time he found that it felt nice.

“I just don’t want you to get hurt,” she whispered in his ear.

Bucky squeezed her tighter.

Somehow the hug really did make him feel better. Suddenly he could breathe easier, and could feel the tension fading from his chest.

Then he saw Becca’s pale face peering round from behind the doorway. She looked just as guilty as she had before. Bucky knew that he should probably feel angry at her – since it was her fault that their mom had found out about his secret – and a minute ago he probably would have done. As he had these soft hugs from his mom though, he just couldn’t summon those intense emotions that he had been feeling before. They wouldn’t come.

He smiled at her. It seemed to make her feel a little better. He could see the guilt fade off her face.

Patting his mom’s back, he pulled away.

Even though she looked less angry now, he found himself feeling a kernel of guilt. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

To be fair, even he didn’t know if he would actually take the plunge and get rid of his death if he could. It was just an enticing idea. Something that he thought sounded good in theory.

His mom seemed to have little to say to him after that. Bucky couldn’t put a finger on it, but there was sadness behind her eyes.

Eventually he ended up back in his room. It felt sort of like he was hiding away, like he thought that if he was in his own little place he couldn’t be disturbed in the same way.

There was also a part of him which was slightly worried about Becca using his laptop. It hadn’t been what he thought about to begin with – he had been far too worried about what they had found – but now that he had the time, he could see the empty space where his laptop had sat on his desk. For a long time it wouldn’t have bothered him to have Becca borrow his things like that, but now that he thought about it, it almost seemed like something he should have been worried about now.

Or was it on him to make sure that his sister wasn’t going to find anything that he didn’t want her to?

He didn’t want to think about this anymore.

He turned to the technique that he usually used when he wanted out of a situation. Getting back into bed, he decided that sleep would be the best way for him to avoid what he didn’t want to think about.

It hadn’t failed him so far.

**

Steve woke up to the obnoxious sound of his phone trying to get his attention. The buzzing against his bedside table was far too loud, and annoying, and Steve just wanted it to stop.

Flopping a hand out, he tried to get it without opening his eyes. After nearly knocking it clear off the table, he managed to get it in his hand – and, naturally, by the time he actually got to looking at the screen, it had stopped buzzing.

He was far too awake to go back to sleep now, but neither did he want to deal with whatever it was that had woken him in the first place. He sighed.

Sam  
answer my calls, dickhead

Steve frowned. What was Sam talking about?

Another message came through.

Sam  
We were gonna have a call today, remember?

Shit. Now that Sam brought it up, Steve totally remembered their conversation the other day, about how it had been too long since they’d talked in any other way that wasn’t just texting. Yikes.

He made to reply as quickly as possible.

Me  
Sorry! Forgive me?

Putting his phone down, he decided to get on with getting up things, so that he would be ready to talk to Sam in a minute.

He had to rush a little to get it done in time – he could see the way that his death watched him curiously as he pottered around the bathroom and the kitchen. They probably knew exactly what was going on – there was every chance that actually they were judging him for not being ready on time again.

Getting back into his bedroom just as the sound of the call coming through began to fill it, he practically jumped onto his bed. Crawling over to where his phone lay, almost drowning under all the layers of blanket, he picked it up (thankfully without accidentally ending the call this time) and hit the answer button.

After a few seconds of black, Sam’s face popped up on screen. “Hey there,” he said, grinning.

It was catching – Steve couldn’t help but smile back, it was entirely involuntary.

Catching up with Sam was the highlight of his day. He hadn’t got to talk to him nearly often enough in the past few weeks, with both of them having been busy more often than not.

It passed the next few hours in happiness.

**

Michelle’s face was serious as he stepped into her office. It wasn’t often that she refused to come out to fetch him – a sure sign that there was something up with her.

Not that Bucky didn’t know about his traitorous parents contacting her for an emergency appointment. When he had woken this morning to immediately be told that he was going to have to get more therapy, he had had no idea what they were talking about. His mom hadn’t seemed like she had been overly worried after they’d talked the other day – but it was clear that it wasn’t the case.

For once, Bucky was slightly worried as he took the seat on the other side of the desk.

“I had a worrying phone call yesterday,” Michelle began, her tone as low and sober as her face. “I knew that you were having problems accepting your death in your life, and I can tell that you must have had trouble in doing what I suggested that you do. But I never thought…” she paused, looking down and readjusting things on her desk. “I didn’t think you would want to go to such lengths though.”

Bucky gulped. He had no idea what kind of answer Michelle was looking for.

So the obvious answer was to lie. “I was just curious,” Bucky said, shrugging. “I just wanted to look it up.”

Michelle turned a discerning eye on him. “Were you? Because this seems rather a lot like it would be something that someone like you, who wants nothing to do with their death, would find very tempting.”

Shit. She was onto him. He tried not to give away that she had hit the nail on the head – he stayed where he was, and he kept on fiddling with his own fingers. “Maybe,” he said, “but I wasn’t going to do anything.” He looked up at her, trying his best to look convincing.

“After what you told me last time…” she looked more concerned than she had seen her do in any of their sessions. “After that, I thought you were getting better. That we were getting somewhere, that you’d get past part of your fear and be able to…”

“Be able to what? To be normal?” Bucky scoffed. “I don’t think so. Not when I can’t – I can’t even –“

“You promised me you’d try to talk to them about it.” Michelle’s voice was as stable as ever, but for once it didn’t sound sincere. “You said you’d try…” she took a deep, shuddering breath. When she spoke again, she sounded more stable. “What prompted you to google that? Really.”

For a moment, Bucky was tempted to tell her the truth. To explain the real reason why he wanted his death gone completely, and damn with the questions.

Part of him wanted to have someone understand. To get why he needed that to happen.

“I was just curious,” he said, repeating the things he had said earlier.

“Are you sure about that?” Michelle asked. It sounded very much like she didn’t believe him.

Bucky cocked his head to the side. “Look,” he said, ignoring the question that Michelle had asked, “if I were to – hypothetically, if I did say that I was looking it up to try to go through with it… what would happen?”

Michelle frowned at him. “Well,” she said, coughing. “You know that I’m required to keep everything you tell me in these sessions private. The only exception is if I think you will harm yourself or others, and… well, I think that would qualify.”

Shit. “I thought you might say that,” he said, knowing that it was definitely the case. It was the main reason he couldn’t admit to anything, even if he thought that he could talk to her about it. Even if he thought that she could convince him that it was a bad idea.

She placed a hand over his. It was close to comforting. “You should tell me, though,” she said, ruining the moment. “If it’s important, you shouldn’t let it fester.”

Maybe she was right. Still, Bucky didn’t want to take the risk of getting locked up for telling the truth. Or, at least, some semblance of it.

“Another time,” he said.

**

Steve woke up, not knowing that today was going to be one of the strangest days he’d had yet.

It was with total innocence that had he slept in, enjoying his Saturday (with heating and everything), knowing that he could afford to wait until later to get on with his art.

The first thing he did was check his phone. It was a good idea – with Sam being in a different time zone, there was every chance that he might have tried to contact him already. This time he hadn’t, but it was always worth doing.

He did have a message from his mom though – she wanted to know if he wanted to come over for dinner. It was almost like she didn’t know that he was very easily convinced into seeing her as often as she wanted him to.

He replied to that message, happily going through the notifications that he did have – and then he noticed the five missed call he had from Mr Barnes.

Steve frowned. What could they possibly want from him? He tried to think back to what they could need to talk to him about – he was sure that he had paid his rent on time, and Mr Barnes had said last weekend that he didn’t need to pay for the boiler fixing, since it wasn’t his fault.

He thought about calling back, and seeing what they wanted.

Anxiety was filling his stomach, and – it gurgled. Nope, he was just hungry.

Deciding that he would tackle this once he had eaten, he threw his comforter off the bed, slipped to sit sideways on the bed, and put his feet in his slippers. As he left the room, he picked up his robe from the back of his door. It wasn’t completely necessary just yet, but he liked having the fluffy warmth around him – it added to that great fall feel, he felt.

Going through to the kitchen, he noticed that his death was in the living room, looking at the paintings of them. Perhaps it was a little prideful of him, but Steve couldn’t help but think that a death’s seal of approval somehow meant a little more than a human’s.

Trying not to think about that too deeply, he rummaged around in his cupboards for some cereal. He was sure that he had some in there somewhere –

Ah-ha! Right at the back of one of them there was the chocolate cereal he indulged in sometimes. It being the weekend definitely made it count, he decided, as he poured himself a bowl of it.

He wanted to go eat it in the living room. It was just slightly too noisy in the kitchen, he thought – on one of the downsides of it looking straight out onto the street.

Carefully carrying it through, with steady steps, he sat himself on the lone couch that was in there. It wouldn’t matter too much if he spilled anything on it, he knew (it was stained enough from painting too near it), but spilling milk on it would still make it smell, and he didn’t have the money to replace it (nor did he want to deal with getting it all the way downstairs before he absolutely had to).

He took one delicious bite, the flavour almost better than he remembered.

And then there was a knock on the door.

he paused. Nobody should have been able to get through the door at the bottom without a key.

…Then who could it be?

Setting his bowl down on the coffee table, he wrapped his robe a little tighter around himself, and walked over to the door. (Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed his death floating into the room behind him. That made him feel slightly better – it was good to know that his death had his back.)

If only his front door had a peephole.

Half expecting to be murdered the moment the door opened, he yanked on the handle.

“Hi there!” Mr Barnes was stood outside his door. He looked almost sheepish, like he knew he shouldn’t be here, but he was anyway. “Can I come in?”

Steve blinked. “I – sure?” He said, stepping to the side on autopilot.

Mr Barnes walked in – and it was at this point Steve noticed the young man walking in behind him. He couldn’t help but stare – this was highly irregular.

Turning to Mr Barnes, Steve hoped that his expression of confusion would make it clear that he needed an explanation.

“I wanted to check that your boiler is okay,” Mr Barnes said, seeming almost surprised himself that Steve didn’t know what he was talking about. “Did… did I not tell you about that?” He began to look sheepish when Steve shook his head.

Steve’s eyes flicked between Mr Barnes and the other man. Now that that mystery had been solved, now all that remained was the mystery of why there was a complete stranger in Steve’s home.

“Oh! This is my son, Bucky,” Mr Barnes said, not looking repentant at all. “I wanted to bring him along, I hope that’s okay.”

Bucky looked petulant, like a moody teenager. It made Steve wonder whether his immediate assumption that the guy wasn’t one was wrong.

Still, it wasn’t like Steve could object to him being here, not when they had already come in. “Sure,” he said instead. “That’s fine.”

He wondered if perhaps Bucky was here to help his father. That seemed like it would be a reasonable thing, and it would certainly -

Nope. Mr Barnes immediately set off in the direction of the bathroom, and Bucky remained in Steve’s living room. Great.

After even a few seconds of this, Steve began to feel slightly uncomfortable. Bucky hadn’t said so much as a word, and he simply stood in the middle of the room, glowering.

(Privately, Steve had to wonder if Bucky was… okay? He didn’t look unkempt, as such, but he looked like he had been dragged here straight from his bed. His clothes were rumpled, his hair hung into his face limply, and his posture was entirely slouched. If he hadn’t known better, Steve might have thought that he had been forced to be here.)

“So… do you do this a lot?” Steve asked, trying to make conversation.

Bucky stared at him. It almost made Steve wonder if the other man had actually understood him.

“You got forced to come here, huh?”

This time, Bucky nodded – only slightly, but enough that Steve was relatively sure he’d got a reaction out of him.

Giving up for now, Steve moved away from the other man. He was proving a little too strange for Steve’s liking, and he wasn’t sure what the solution to this solution was going to be. The only thing that he could think to do was to check up on Mr Barnes, so see how the boiler was. He didn’t think that it had played up in the time since it had been fixed, but it seemed reasonable that it was going to be checked.

Walking over to his bedroom, Steve was almost surprised when he saw Bucky following him out of the corner of his eye. Well, no, he _was_ surprised at first – but then he realised that it really didn’t surprise him that much at all. Not when he had clearly shown that he had no clue what he was doing here.

Saying nothing, Steve continued on to his bathroom. If nothing he was going to say was going to dissuade the other man from doing what he was doing, then there wasn’t much point in trying.

As they did, Steve saw his death float out of the bathroom. Knowing that they had probably been keeping watch on Mr Barnes, he smiled.

Then he noticed the way that Bucky reacted the moment the death floated over to them. An immediate flinch. That was that most obvious one, but he also saw the way that the flinch turned Bucky’s body so that he was half facing away from them.

That was odd.

Still, it was probably best if he didn’t point it out. It was entirely possible that he had simply been startled – something entirely understandable, when deaths were a large mass of black that often came out of nowhere.

“I’m just seeing how things go,” Steve explained, talking over his shoulder, hoping that if he tried talking to Bucky more, it might make things feel a little more natural. “Wanting to know whether my apartment is going to blow up.” He chuckled, trying to make the joke a joke.

It didn’t seem to work.

Bucky still followed him – but he didn’t say anything, didn’t seem like he was really noticing the conversation that Steve was trying to make.

It was at this point that Steve stopped trying to make conversation with this strange man. He was willing to forgive things up to a point, but the fact that Mr Barnes had brought his son with him without asking hadn’t helped matters at all. Steve didn’t have to play the host to someone who clearly didn’t want to be here, as mean as it might have seemed.

They simply waited in silence for Mr Barnes to be done playing around with the boiler in silence, with Steve’s patience trickling away, like an egg timer running out of sand. Thankfully, it didn’t take too long – and Steve had to admit, he was sort of glad that he didn’t have to spend much longer with Bucky.

As he ushered both of them out when Mr Barnes was done, Steve noticed that they both had weird reactions to his paintings. They hadn’t really done it on the way in, but as they walked past them, Mr Barnes kept his eyes on them, while Bucky averted his eyes like they were horrendous.

Both of these were strange reactions – strange in that they were so extreme. For the most part, Steve found that most people were simply apathetic to his death art – they just didn’t care either way.

Maybe it would finally be a chance to sell some of it, Steve thought to himself as he closed the door. If Mr Barnes was interested, then it definitely could make for a good opportunity.

But for now he had more important things to be getting on with than worrying about his weird landlord and his son.

Even though Bucky had been weird, Steve did his best to forget about how awkward it had been to try to communicate with that man.

And it worked. For a few weeks, at least.

**

Bucky felt the firm hand of his dad on his back. It pressed into him, pushing him forwards in an uncomfortable way. “Do you mind?” He muttered as he stumbled slightly.

His dad said nothing, but he did get shoved in a different direction again.

Bucky knew there was little point in protesting any more. Ever since his drama with his mom the other day, his dad had been weird around him. It felt like he didn’t quite know how to act around him anymore. Like he thought something had changed.

Jeez.

Sometimes Bucky wondered whether it would have just been easier to google about suicide instead.

(And then he would think about how it probably was a bad thing that that somehow didn’t seem worse.)

The coffee shop that his dad had forced him to come to didn’t seem particularly special. It was near the place they’d gone the other day, when his dad had had to deal with the tenant in the rental property. He’d said he’d seen it when they were there, and thought it would be a nice place to come, he’d said. To Bucky though, it didn’t seem any different from most of the places he’d ever been.

“Just – just get yourself something and sit down,” his dad said, shoving some cash into his hand. “I’ll be back in a bit.”

In all the (small amount) of conversation they’d had on the journey here, not once had his dad said anything about needing to go anywhere else while they were here. “Wait, I –“

It was too late. His dad had already gone out the door. Bucky turned back to the counter. Well, at least it wasn’t too busy in here. It would have been much worse if it had been crowded. Bucky couldn’t deal with the idea that there could be that many people and that many deaths in the world.

Going up to the counter, he ordered himself a large coffee. It wasn’t the best idea in the world – especially with all the problems he had right now – but somehow it seemed like what he really needed was the caffeine, just to keep his energy up.

There was only a very small queue at the counter. In what seemed like no time at all, Bucky’s coffee was ready. He chose a seat at the front of the shop. His need to be near the windows, near the light, was too strong.

Even though he could have kept a lookout for his dad getting back, he didn’t. There was too much worry inside him to even think about that right now.

Hands around his mug of coffee, he tried to keep them warm. He hadn’t brought his gloves with him – a foolish move, but he really hadn’t thought that he would need them at all.

He stared into the swirling depths of the coffee. It was dark, and reminded him slightly too much of the darkness that he did his best to avoid nowadays.

His mind sort of switched off a little as he watched his drink.

Distantly, he registered the tinkling of the door opening again.

“Bucky?”

He blinked. That was his name. looking up, he realised that his dad was stood there. With another man. A familiar one.

“Yeah?” What was going on? Why was Steve here again? His hands tightened a little on his mug.

Steve shuffled a little. He sort of looked like he wanted to be here about as much as Bucky wanted to be. Bucky could respect that.

“This is Steve. Do you remember him? You met him the other day.” His dad half turned to gesture at him. “Um – I thought he could be your friend.”

Bucky’s blood turned to ice water. A conversation he had had with his dad after his mom had chewed him out came to mind – one which he hadn’t thought would be taken seriously.

_“Bucky, I just think you need some friends.”_

_“But I have you guys. I have Becca. Isn’t that enough?”_

_“I don’t think so. I think you need some friends your own age. Some that share your interests. And you need to get out of the house a bit more, I think.”_

_“Dad, I go to my therapy meetings. I go out when mom asks me to. Isn’t that enough?”_

_“Not when you don’t go out any other time, no. Wouldn’t you like to go out with friends? Have fun?”_

_“That doesn’t sound good. I don’t think I could imagine anything worse, dad.”_

_“Well what if I was to find you a friend?”_

_“Yeah, okay, you do that.”_

In no way had Bucky expected his dad to take that as a challenge.

He grimaced. “Sorry about this,” he said to Steve. he gave Bucky a tense smile. Taking his dad by the arm, he pulled him far away enough that Steve (hopefully) couldn’t hear them. “What about this did you think would be a good idea?” He hissed. “You can’t – you can’t just _ask_ someone to be your friend!”

His dad looked bemused. “Sure you can,” he said. “I specifically remember someone making a ton of friends as a five year old by going up to them and asking to be friends. Why –“

“Oh god.” Bucky didn’t even feel bad for interrupting his dad. He dragged a hand over his face. “I really shouldn’t have to explain this to you. You should know better, I swear, dad. But that’s not how friendship works.”

His dad gave a nonchalant shrug. “Would you try it anyway?”

Bucky glanced over at Steve. He had begun to look nervous – Bucky got the feeling that he probably felt about the same way as he did with this whole thing.

Then he looked back at his dad. There was some sort of hope on his face – and suggestion that he really did just want Bucky to be happy. Even if this wasn’t the best way to try to go about it.

Goddamnit.

In a flash, Bucky knew that he was going to give in. As if he wasn’t introverted enough, and didn’t have enough to entertain himself with.

He swallowed. “Okay.”

His dad’s expression cleared. “Thank you,” he said quietly. “I – I’ll leave you two alone to talk.”

Well that had gone so great the last time, hadn’t it? Yes, clearly Bucky’s dad had been paying crazy amounts of attention to the way that they had gotten on like a house on fire. If the house was made of asbestos.

Half expecting Steve to refuse, to make an excuse and leave, Bucky sat there, eyes wide and entirely anxious.

And then Steve took a seat. Bucky watched in horror as his dad smiled, like something good had happened, and walked away. Everything inside him wanted to follow.

But at the same time, he sort of didn’t want to. As he looked at Steve, the memories of the last time they had seen each other came to mind. The way that he had clammed up, unable to say anything when he was too busy thinking how cute Steve looked. The way that he had entirely embarrassed himself.

Those emotions rose inside him again. The ultimate embarrassment of his actions, the way being around someone who so clearly had their life together made him feel. The way that he didn’t want to be reminded of that in the slightest.

Whether or not Steve could see any of this going on under his skin he didn’t know. He hoped he couldn’t.

Steve gave him an awkward smile. “So how are you today?”

It was such a simple question that Bucky knew he should be able to answer easily. The expected answer to a question like that was of course ‘fine’. And really, that was what he should say. He could feel it, right there at the forefront of his brain.

He couldn’t bring himself to say it though. not when it would entirely be a lie. Not when he felt so completely out of control of his own life, when he didn’t know where any of this was going or where it would end. When he felt more confused and upset than he had in a while.

And so all that came out was a shrug.

Immediately he felt bad. He could see the way the corners of Steve’s mouth dropped. Probably the poor man had been expecting that maybe Bucky would be more talkative today. After all, he would have just seen him and his dad talking just fine.

It was different when it was strangers though. And that wasn’t something that Bucky could help, not in the slightest.

They sat there for a minute. Bucky’s drink was cooling in front of them – he could see the way the steam was getting lesser and lesser – and yet he couldn’t bring himself to pick it up and drink it. The idea of something going wrong, the awkwardness that came from being the only one with something to eat or drink… it made him feel physically sick. And then of course, that only added to him not wanting to ingest anything.

So he sat there, fingers practically twitching to pick up his mug, and being unable to.

Steve looked at him. it almost felt like he was seeing through all of his facades, in a similar way to Michelle. It was like he couldn’t hide.

Or maybe he was just reading into things too much.

“I’m going to go get something to eat,” Steve said finally, standing up. Bucky watched jealously as he walked over to the counter and easily ordered what he wanted. In another life, perhaps he would have been able to be so carefree about his ability to get simple tasks like that done.

(Or perhaps in a life where he hadn’t made the mistakes where he had. There were plenty of memories in there, only half hidden, where he had been so much more confident as a teenager. He could easily remember not having these problems.

It was more of a struggle than it should have been to force himself to not think about them too much, and to focus on what was going on in front of him.)

In the time when Steve was gone, Bucky tried to take advantage of his sudden ability to have his drink. It almost felt silly now, in the face of only his own thoughts, to have not been able to drink it before. Like a weight had been taken off his shoulders, or like it had happened to someone else.

By the time Steve returned, he had drunk everything but the dregs of his coffee. It had been lukewarm, and not the best tasting any more, but it had been worth drinking all the same.

“I thought I’d get myself a bottle of water,” Steve said, placing it down on the table between them. “Sometimes their sandwiches can get a little dry, you know?” It was then that Bucky noticed the plate he had also been carrying. How had he missed that they did proper food too?

His stomach growled. Naturally, it was loudly, and at a time where the conversation in the shop had reached a lull.

He could feel blood rushing to his face. He half expected some teasing from Steve, whether light or otherwise. That was pretty normal, right?

“Do you want half of this?” He asked instead. With understanding eyes, Steve pushed the plate so that it was in the middle of the table. Bucky stared at the sandwich. It had roasted cheese on the top. Plus it was already cut in two.

He looked up at Steve with apprehensive eyes.

“I probably wasn’t going to be able to finish the whole thing anyway,” Steve said, smiling encouragingly. Honestly, Bucky could believe it. He had seen the man in less clothing yesterday, and he had looked stupidly skinny. Even more skinny than Bucky was. And that was saying something.

Politeness dictated that he should refuse. He should say no, because Steve had been the one to pay for it, and because they were really friends (regardless of what his dad thought).

He nodded.

Steve beamed. It was the most emotion he had seen out of the man so far. And it made him look even more wonderful.

Bucky couldn’t bring himself to look away until Steve ducked his head to start eating the sandwich. He was entirely transfixed against his own wishes – he just couldn’t find any reason to stop looking.

And then his stomach growled again. The smell from the sandwich had begun to waft towards him. it made him remember that he had barely eaten anything this morning – mostly because he hadn’t known that they were going to be going anywhere today.

He reached out a shaky hand and took hold of the other half.

Beginning to eat it, he noticed the way that Steve was watching him. He did his best to pretend like he hadn’t noticed, like he couldn’t see it. But he knew it was there. It reminded him momentarily of the fact that in the past week he hadn’t shaved once. Some people could pull off the scraggly beard look, but he wasn’t one of them. Most of the time it didn’t bother him (especially since he tried to avoid mirrors in general) but on occasions like this he wondered whether he should have put in more effort to his look. He could feel the way his hair brushed his shoulders, the way that it was slightly more matted than it probably should be.

This was no way to attract another human being.

He couldn’t do anything about it right now though.

They ate in silence. This time it was slightly different though. He knew that before it had felt awkward, like neither of them wanted to do anything for fear of them being weird.

Now though, they knew what was going on.

As he took the last few bites, Bucky noticed that this whole time he’d been stressing about Steve being here so much that he barely noticed that both of their deaths were there. Logically he knew that they must have been there the whole time – but somehow it had entirely escaped his notice that they were there.

They were so dark and ominous. Now that he had noticed them, it was almost impossible to go back to not seeing them. Steve’s was stood right behind him, as well. It even looked like their hand was right on Steve’s shoulder – something that Bucky couldn’t have even imagined his own death doing. Even thinking about it horrified him.

His own death was off to the side. They were probably actually a little too far away for being in public. That wasn’t good… but Bucky also didn’t want the embarrassment that would surely come with having to chastise his death in public. Especially since there were very high chances that his death would not want to listen to him at all.

Trying to ignore it as best as he could, he noticed that Steve had nearly finished his half of sandwich too. Unlike Bucky, he was looking at his phone – and he pretty much had been this entire time. Bucky could see the way that he was smiling at whoever he was talking to… Something which made Bucky feel more jealous than he was proud of.

The knowledge that Steve had many friends and he didn’t flipped some sort of switch inside him. He couldn’t explain it, but some part of him that had wanted nothing to do with the idea of making new friends had entirely dissipated. The way that he had been mad at his dad for orchestrating a meeting to become friends was entirely gone now. It had been replaced with the intense desire to be friends with Steve, to be the reason that he was smiling down at his phone. It was a desire he hadn’t felt in a long time.

“Are you okay?”

Bucky’s head shot up. He hadn’t even realised it had been down, but he had been staring at his lap this entire time. That probably wasn’t good, but he couldn’t find it in him to care either.

But he hadn’t expected Steve to be asking him more questions, either.

If he was going to achieve that goal, he was going to have to actually try. Even if it was difficult.

He swallowed. “I’m okay,” he said. It was more true than it would have been if he’d answered Steve’s earlier question. The confusion that had plagued him before was mostly gone. He had a clearer idea of what he wanted now.

Steve looked surprised at this. “Good,” he said, looking like he was trying to regain control of the situation. “Did you enjoy the sandwich?”

Bucky nodded. “I did.” Then, realising that he hadn’t done it earlier, added, “thank you for that.”

For some reason his voice sounded raspier than usual. It hadn’t even done that earlier – it hadn’t sounded like he hadn’t talked for a week and then tried to gargle razors. Which, a big excessive, but that was sort of what it sounded like.

Steve’s eyebrows raised, and his eyes widened. “Here, have some of this,” he said, concerned.

Bucky wasn’t particularly thirsty, but he took the water gratefully anyway.

This seemed to be something that he was slowly learning about Steve – that he was kind. Bucky liked that. It was a good trait to have, he thought, and he wished that he had it himself. Or, that he could gain that back.

He gave the bottle back to Steve when he was done. The water had been cool and nice in his mouth, and it had made him realise that his throat had actually been sort of hurting. Maybe he should talk more, use his voice more. It wouldn’t be good to actually ruin another part of him.

“Thanks,” he said, feeling a little like he was beginning to repeat himself.

It was now that he noticed that his death had come up beside him. What were they going to do, feed him the water themselves? That was weird.

Leaning away from them a little, Bucky tried to think of something else that he could say to Steve. How could he convince Steve that he was someone worth being friends with?

“I really am sorry that my dad dragged you here,” he blurted out. That really wasn’t anything like what he’d intended to say. What? Why had he done that? Internally, he began to panic, worrying that perhaps it would have ruined all of his chances entirely of ever getting Steve to think of him as someone other than ‘that weird guy who was in my apartment once and wouldn’t talk to me’.

Steve shook his head, looking a little bemused. “It’s okay, really.” It sounded pretty genuine.

Bucky had to check though. just to be sure. “Are you sure? I swear I didn’t put my dad up to this.” He felt like that was very important to stress, even if perhaps Steve had suspected that to begin with. It had been such a surprise that there was almost no way that he wouldn’t have done, but he had to check anyway.

“It didn’t look like that at all, don’t worry.” He still sounded and looked pretty sincere. Bucky didn’t want to not believe him – especially since that would change the way he saw him – but part of him still didn’t quite believe it. The chances of him being some loner who needed his parents to find friends for him must have seemed oddly high.

“Oh, good.” It would have seemed especially weird after the actual first time that they met though – and it was that memory that prompted Bucky to add, “I’m sorry about the other day, you know.”

Steve frowned. “What do you mean?”

Oh god – that just made it worse. He was going to have to spell out exactly what it was that he was so embarrassed about, wasn’t he? “Well, I just didn’t feel very comfortable, and I didn’t think that I’d be very good at answering any of your questions. I’m sorry if I made you feel weird, or… something.” He couldn’t even word it properly. He probably made no sense at all, and -

“You didn’t.” Steve’s voice was low, and serious, and Bucky couldn’t help but absolutely believe him. If Steve said he hadn’t been awkward, then he hadn’t, no questions asked.

“Okay then,” Bucky breathed out. They were sat there for a minute, Bucky contemplating what he might have done to make Steve _not_ think that he was a total creep, and also trying to ignore the fact that his death was coming closer and closer to his face. If he had been at home, he would already have run away – but here there was no escape. The only thing stronger than his fear of his own death was the knowledge that he had to behave ‘normally’ in public.

Then Steve spoke again. “Okay, well, yeah, maybe it did seem a little strange, but it didn’t make me feel weird.”

Damnit. He had seemed strange after all. Hurt stabbed through him. Then why had Steve said that it hadn’t been strange in the first place?

He didn’t want to ask about it anymore though. He could see the way that Steve clearly felt awkward about it – maybe about the lying, but maybe about the situation that they’d been in – and he didn’t think that pushing the issue would do either of them any good.

He needed to change the topic. “So what do you do?” He asked, thinking that that perhaps that would be the thing they needed to talk about.

Steve looked up at him. “Oh, I’m a master’s student.” That did make a lot of sense, Bucky had to admit.

“What do you study?” He asked, ever so slightly in awe of anyone who was smart enough to do that much college.

“Art.” Steve almost looked embarrassed about that fact. (Bucky tried to not get distracted by how adorable he looked like that, with his cheeks lightly reddened.)

He nodded, leaning forward across the table. “That makes a lot of sense,” he said, thinking back to how Steve’s apartment had looked.

Steve’s eyes widened. “It does?” Crap, he hadn’t sounded too creepy, had he?

Bucky coughed, trying to seem less like a crazy person. “Well yeah, I saw all your artwork and I guess I just assumed that you had a lot of time on your hands.” He shrugged, thinking that it sounded more and more creepy the more that he

Steve laughed. It made Bucky feel good. “Can it not be both?”

“I suppose it could be, yes… but I wouldn’t have thought that you’d need to hoard the paintings that you make.” He instantly regretted it. That just made it sound mean.

Thankfully, Steve didn’t seem to mind it. He shrugged. “Well there’s really not much else I can do about it – my apartment isn’t exactly big, and there’s only so many of them I can give to my mom.”

Bucky frowned. “Can you not leave them at college?”

“I could for some of them, but most of them are from my undergrad years, and I would have lost them. Plus some of them aren’t from my classes, and it would seem silly to get rid of them.” Steve looked almost embarrassed.

“But surely there would be more sensible ways to store them, still?” Bucky still couldn’t get his head round the idea of it. How could he stand to live like that?

“Yeah, maybe, but my apartment just isn’t big enough for that.” Steve sighed. It sounded like he was frustrated.

Bucky tapped his fingers on the table. What was he meant to say to that. “That’s a shame,” he settled for. He was about to drive Steve away with it. For sure. He couldn’t even hold a decent conversation -

“I know, but I just can’t bear to get rid of any of it,” Steve said. He didn’t sound mad. He mostly sounded like he had before – neutral, in a bemused way.

Bucky swallowed. “Yeah, I know that feeling.” He didn’t mention any of the things hanging out in his room. The fact that he was a hypocrite in this conversation wasn’t lost on him. All of the things from before that he didn’t use were still around, taking up room and reminding him that things had changed.

“Oh, really?” Steve looked at him expectantly.

Shit. Now he’d set himself up for more than he was willing to give. “Uh – oh, it’s just – I have too much stuff too.” The most generic thing he could have said.

Steve nodded.

Bucky didn’t really know what to say after that. There was nothing he could add to the conversation they’d just been having.

Yet he didn’t want for this to be the only conversation they ever had.

“Do you wanna see each other… I dunno, another time?”

Steve smiled. “Yeah, I’d like that. Give me your number?”

With hands that were slightly numb, Bucky handed over his phone so that Steve could put in his number, and took Steve’s phone to do the same. It felt so strange, and part of him felt like it wasn’t really happening. His eyes began to blur a little – it felt a lot like he was dreaming, like nothing going on around him was real.

Realising that Steve was holding his hand out holding his phone, Bucky hastily took his back and handed Steve’s over.

It was at this point that Bucky saw his dad approaching through the window. “I think I have to go now,” he said dreamily, standing up.

Steve stood up too. Bucky was reminded of the other day, when he had noticed just how much shorter than him Steve was. It was sort of adorable, and he couldn’t help but grin. “Okay – I’ll see you soon?” Steve’s eyes were wide, like he was worried that Bucky might genuinely not contact him again. It was a nice feeling.

Bucky nodded. “Yeah, of course.”

Then he wandered out of the door – and for once, he didn’t care that his death was right on his heels.

And as his dad directed them to where he’d parked the car, he found that he felt better than he had done in a long time.

**

Steve looked up as there was a knock at the door. Office hours had begun only a few minutes before, and he hadn’t been expecting anyone to turn up just yet.

“Yes?” He called out, hoping that whoever it was would be able to hear him and he wouldn’t have to get up.

The door opened a crack. “Mr Rogers?” A small voice called out.

It was Becca, the student he’d met last week. He smiled. “You know I told you to call me Steve,” he said, gesturing for her to come in.

“I know, but I always feel like it doesn’t make sense when we’ve just come from a lecture,” she said. “Especially since you weren’t there today.” She opened the door wider, and she and her death floated on.

Steve nodded. “I know, I was just too busy to come today,” he said apologetically. He liked to do his best to turn up to all the lectures that he could, so that he could understand what material the students might be struggling with, but it could be difficult when he had so many other things on. He’d needed the studio time this time, when he had to finish up important paintings for professors who would only give extensions if you were actually dying. And while Steve could definitely have made that case, what with his own ill health, he would never actually use it as an excuse. That would just be dishonest.

Becca came and sat on the chair next to him. For the past few minutes it had been occupied by his death, and for a minute there Steve thought that they weren’t going to move and let Becca sit down. That would have been incredibly awkward – but thankfully they did move, and probably left the chair feeling a little cold.

She sat down next to him, slumped very far down the chair. “That can’t possibly be comfortable,” Steve remarked, looking at the way there was a full foot of space between the edge of the chair and her knee, and the way that her chin was full on her neck.

“It isn’t,” she said, only sounding a little strangled, “I’m just tired.” Her eyes closed, and Steve thought that it didn’t look like a voluntary action.

Instinctively, Steve wanted to pat her head – just to give her comfort. If she had just been a friend, he almost certainly would have done.

She was his student, though, and not only did he have to remain professional for teaching purposes, but also for ‘not getting kicked out of college for being inappropriate’ reasons.

Instead, he settled for saying, “well you can sit there for a minute until you’re ready to learn.” To be fair, it was a Friday – everyone in the college was tired, and they’d only been back for a month or so.

True to his word, he allowed Becca to just sit there and relax. He really didn’t expect anybody else to be worried enough about their learning on a Friday afternoon to come in – this session turned into a nap for him more often than he would like to admit.

Talking of naps, for a full second there he wondered if she might have actually fallen asleep. Just because he could nap when nobody was in here didn’t mean that he was allowed to use his office space as a place for his students to nap. If nothing else, he couldn’t imagine that waking up from a position like that would be comfortable in the slightest.

But, eventually, her eyes opened. “Sorry about that, Mr Rogers,” Becca said through an almighty yawn, only covered a bit with her hand. “I didn’t mean to do that – I think I fell asleep for a moment there.” She looked at him sheepishly, and Steve didn’t have it in him to tell her off for it.

He waved a hand. “It’s okay,” he said. He thought about mentioning that he did the same sometimes – but then he thought that it probably wouldn’t do his reputation any favours.

“So what did you come here for? I didn’t think it was just to have a nap in my chair,” he teased.

With a groan, Becca sat herself up. It looked like it took more effort than either of them were expecting – Steve could see the strain in her arms as she heaved her body into a more comfortable position.

“You’re right,” she said, once she was in a more reasonable position. “I didn’t come here for that, although I have to admit that it’s a good bonus.” She flashed him a cheeky grin. “It was actually because I wasn’t fully paying attention in the last lecture, and I thought this would be a good way of catching up?” Her grin changed from cheeky to sheepish.

Steve frowned. “If you weren’t paying attention in class, that’s not my job. I’ll help you, but could you not ask your friends in the class to catch you up?” It wasn’t unusual for him to be approached by students who hadn’t paid attention, or who had skipped classes entirely and were brazen about that fact. Becca didn’t seem like that type, but he never appreciated having his time being used like that, even when it was students that he liked.

Becca’s happy expression fell. “No, not like that,” she said, shaking her head. “I mean that I went to class, and I tried to pay attention – I really did – but there’s just been so much going on in my life recently, and I can’t… I can’t stop thinking about all of it.” She sighed – and she sounded much older than her age.

Steve couldn’t help but feel for her. He knew a lot about having family troubles – although admittedly, for a lot of that he had been the problem family member. “Is everything alright?” He asked, wishing again that it wouldn’t be weird if he touched her. “If things are that bad, then have you thought about taking some time off, officially? I’m sure –“

Becca began to shake her head. “No, it’s not bad enough for that,” she said regretfully. “I don’t think they’d let me have any official time off. I just – I just think I need to take some time to make sure that I’m not going to mess things up with college.”

“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather do this another time then?” Steve asked, frowning. He didn’t want to make Becca do anything she wasn’t mentally ready for, even if she said that she wanted to get on with learning.

She seemed to consider this for a moment. “I don’t think so,” she said eventually. “I think if I’m learning it here, instead of in a lecture theatre, then I’ll be okay.” She began to look sheepish again. “If I’m under the pressure of being in front of you, instead of having to listen to Prof Kim, then I think I’ll be able to pay attention better.”

Steve could appreciate that explanation.

Taking pity on her, and knowing that there was no point in saying no to her request, he went about explaining what she would have missed in the lecture. It made things a little difficult that he hadn’t been there - he had to do more guesswork on what would have been part of the lecture than he would have liked – but he still thought that he was doing an alright job of getting as much information across as he could.

By the time that he felt like they had covered everything that was essential, it was well past the end of his office hours, and he could see the sun beginning to set out of his office window. “Do you think you’ve got it all?” He asked.

Becca shuffled the papers in front of her. “I think so?” She said. She flicked through all of them. “I’ve taken way more notes than I would have if I’d been paying attention in the lecture,” she said, grinning up at him. “You’re a really good teacher, Steve.”

“Thanks,” he said, stretching his neck. He didn’t want to take the compliment to heart too much – he knew he wasn’t as good at it as he wanted to be – but he also knew that he liked to try his best at it.

“Hopefully we won’t need to do this again next week, huh?” Becca said as she carefully put the papers away in her folder, and then that away in her bag.

Steve stood up, knowing that he was going to be here for a while longer finishing up, but also wanting to take the opportunity to stretch a bit. “I hope not,” he agreed, perhaps a little more seriously than Becca had meant it.

They waited as Becca got herself to leave – somehow more of her stuff had gotten around Steve’s desk over the past two hours than either of them had realised – and eventually, she was at a point where she was ready to leave.

Then something occurred to Steve, something that he wanted to say to her while he had the chance. “Hey,” he said, catching her attention just as she was about to leave the room. “If you need my help next week, that’s fine, but just – promise me that if you need to take time off, you will.”

She looked at him, seeming to realise that he was being serious about it all.

“I know you don’t want to tell me about what’s bothering you,” Steve added, before she could say anything else. “That’s not what I’m expecting. Just – I want to know that you’re okay.”

Slowly, Becca nodded. “I will,” she said, shuffling her feet.

Before either of them could say anything more, she opened the door. “Bye, Steve!” It felt a little like she was fleeing, and Steve didn’t like the sound of it in the slightest.

He couldn’t really do anything about it though. Nor did he think it would be particularly appropriate for him to. “Bye!” He called out, feeling like it was the least he should do.

Maybe he should pay attention to what she got up to next week.

As he got ready to leave, he found himself yawning more than he thought he would. Clearly he was even more tired than he had wanted to admit – or perhaps it was the intense tutoring that had tired him out.

By the time he had dealt with the subway and with inconsiderate pedestrians, he knew that he was pretty much going to have to get into bed immediately. It was only 7pm, and he could do with having dinner, but for now he wanted to just sleep for a whole day. Or maybe petition the government to make the working week four days instead of five. That seemed reasonable.

As he checked his phone for the last time, as he got into bed, he noticed Bucky’s number sat there, taunting him. It had been three days since he had met the guy, and insisted on getting his number. He hadn’t done anything about it just yet, and a small amount of guilt over it filled him. He hadn’t meant to not talk to him yet, but he had so many projects to work on and no time to take to talk to people that he didn’t know all that way.

Part of him wanted to talk to the guy. Their second meeting had been so much more interesting than the last, and he found himself knowing that he wanted to get the chance to know the reasoning for him being so awkward.

But it was late. Or, it felt it, at least. He didn’t have the energy to begin a conversation right now. It wouldn’t be the right time, and he wouldn’t be able to carry a good conversation to make it worth it. He knew that he wanted to make it worth it when he did talk to him.

And so he put the phone down again. He told himself that in the morning, when he had more time, he would get around to it. Never mind the nerves he had about the idea of talking to him again.

He needed to sleep.

**

Bucky stared at his phone.

“Have you talked to Steve again yet?” His dad asked him as he walked past.

Bucky gritted his teeth. “Not yet,” he said, trying not to spit it out too much. His dad pretty much hadn’t shut up about it in the few days since the first meeting had happened. The first few times it hadn’t bothered him that much, but the more time went on the worse it got.

He couldn’t deny that he had hoped that Steve would message him though. The idea of him messaging first was a little too daunting. But, if he could be the one to have Steve talk to him first, somehow it wouldn’t seem so bad. Less nerve-wracking.

But he still couldn’t force Steve to talk to him just by thinking about it. There was nothing he could do. He couldn’t speed up the process.

Beginning to feel more and more frustration at the situation, he stood up. Unlike his usual situation, his death was right behind him. It had been the case ever since he had met Steve – it was like his death had been inspired by Steve’s death to be closer to him. He didn’t know whether he liked it or not.

On the one hand, it was the last thing he could have wanted.

On the other hand, it made him feel normal. The one thing that he had wanted to be ever since he got back here.

He hadn’t decided which one was more important yet.

Not that he even knew if anyone had noticed it yet. If any of his family had, they hadn’t said anything about it.

Even as he went about leaving the room, hoping to avoid his dad’s persistent pestering, he kept thinking about how he hadn’t had any contact from Steve yet.

It hadn’t bothered him the first day, or the second. Only when it got to the point where it was too long to be normal did Bucky realise that it was entirely possible that he wasn’t going to be contacted at all.

Maybe Steve had changed his mind. Or maybe he was expecting a message from him first.

Or, actually, maybe he wasn’t. Not if he ‘d picked up on how awkward Bucky felt during the short amount of time they’d spent together.

He did his best to not look like he was moping around the house.

It was difficult, though – especially since as time went on, he came more and more back to himself. By the time he got up to his room to sit around for a bit, he was back to disliking his death as much as he ever had.

As he settled on his bed, his death floated into the room behind him – and he flinched. His brain had clearly gone back to the way it was before, and he could no longer stand the sight of the stupid, unnecessary –

No. he had to try to not think about that.

Michelle’s words flashed through his mind. ‘Your thoughts are your greatest weapon. If you choose to continue to think negatively, it will only spiral.’

It had been hard to hear, but she had a good point about it. (Even if he still wished he didn’t have to deal with having a death at all.)

Maybe he could try conditioning, he thought.

Sitting up a little, he stared at his death. He could feel that he was glaring – and they didn’t look like they were appreciating this at all. It was hard to tell these days, but he thought he could still tell when his death looked a little bit too uncomfortable. It was all in the slant of the head.

He couldn’t stop the tightening in his chest, and the churning of his stomach that came with looking at this death though. The very sight still filled him with horror – still filled him with the existential dread that came with having been –

Having been through what he had.

He blinked. Having to look away, he turned his head fully away from the death. It felt almost like a failure.

Flopping back onto his bed, he sighed. It shouldn’t’ be a difficult thing to look at your death. That was one of the first things that you learned as a child. That your death was something so important to your wellbeing, and was meant to make you happy.

And yet he couldn’t escape the fact that he couldn’t do that. Not anymore.

Instead, he tried peeking at his death every so often. Just through his eyelashes, just enough that he caught a glimpse of them each time. There was no real change – each time it sent a jolt of fear through his heart.

Then a knock came from his door. It startled him out of his thoughts. (That was probably a good thing – stopped him spiralling.)

He said nothing. He wasn’t really in the mood to be disturbed right now.

Naturally the next moment, the door opened anyway.

His sister walked into the room. Unlike other times, where she was liable to barge in like she owned the place, this time it was more tentative. More like she wanted to see whether he was okay. More like she had when he’d just got back.

He said nothing – simply stared at her. While there was no invitation in there, Becca seemed to take it as such. She walked into the room slowly, slowly enough that Bucky had time to know that he wasn’t going to escape her any time soon.

Shuffling up so that he wasn’t lying down any more, he waited for her to reach him. Even when her death floated in behind her, he didn’t stop her.

“Are you okay?” Becca sat down next to him with a huff, leaning into his side like she used to when she was younger. It was comforting – like the warmth of her body would chase away the lingering coldness that came with having deaths around.

He hummed. “I think so,” he said. Well aware that his voice had sounded much less confident than he had wanted it to, he watched as Becca sat up a little to face him.

She narrowed her eyes at him. “What’s wrong?” She asked, making him think that perhaps that was the question she had meant to ask all along. It was ever so slightly demeaning to have his baby sister be the one worried about him, but he could appreciate that she was just worried about him. he could appreciate the sentiment.

He hesitated to tell her – but couldn’t resist her, in the end. A big part of him wanted for them to be as close as they used to be.

“Steve hasn’t messaged me yet,” he admitted. “I’m beginning to think that he’s not going to at all.”

Becca sort of began to look like she was trying not to laugh. He appreciated that she didn’t, in the end – but the pursing of her lips betrayed her holding it in. “That’s awful,” she said finally, only sounding a little bit like she believed what she was saying.

Bucky sighed. He knew how silly it sounded. To be pining over a boy when he had more important things going on.

Thankfully, Becca didn’t make It weird. She smoothed a hand over his head. “Would it be the worst thing in the world if he didn’t text you?” She asked him.

“Of –“ Bucky paused in the middle of saying that of course it would be. “…I don’t know,” he ended up saying. Because he didn’t. “It would definitely make me sad.”

“But you met him once,” Becca pointed out. “He can’t have made that much of an impression on you.”

He resisted pointing out that he’d technically met Steve twice. “He did though,” he said quietly. Was that embarrassing to admit? Surely strangers shouldn’t be so important to you.

Becca kept stroking his hair. “Is there any reason why you can’t message him first?” She asked softly.

“I – “ Bucky tried to think of a reason for a minute. “I just can’t,” he said. The anxiety that bubbled up inside him at even the thought of being the first one to send a message was almost crippling.

Fortunately, Becca seemed to pick up on that. She pressed a kiss to his forehead, and the warmth from that seemed to counteract some of the cold that made him even more anxious. “Well I guess if you don’t hear from him at all, it probably wasn’t meant to be.”

Having his little sister give him advice felt odd. Still, it was good advice, and Bucky let her comfort him for a while.

By the time Becca left, he was feeling better about the whole thing. If Steve didn’t message him, he’d be fine. It would be sad, but not the end of the world.

He could survive without it.

Determinedly, he picked up his phone and went about using it without opening his messages. He didn’t need to have worried about –

_Ping_

The sound of his text notification made him jump.

Steve  
Hey there! How are you today?

Bucky stared down at the message. The thing that he hadn’t expected to get at all.

After the initial shock had died down, when the tingles had disappeared, he went about getting the keyboard up to reply. It was more difficult than he wanted – his fingers were trembling as he did so.

They ended up talking for a little while after that. Steve didn’t seem to have anything important to say, which was good – it meant that he wasn’t about to tell him that he was sick of talking to him.

The conversation stayed light the entire time. Steve mostly just asked him how he was, and whether he wanted to meet up in person again at some point. Bucky had to admit that he was a little more enthusiastic about that than he would like to admit.

It didn’t escape his notice that once they were done sorting out their meeting time, Steve stopped replying. He wanted to think that this was just because there didn’t need to be anything more said between them. Well, he _wanted_ to think it. He just didn’t quite believe it.

But hey, at least he knew that he was going to get to see Steve again. It was going to be a good thing. He was certain of it.

**

“Steve! I didn’t expect to see you here!”

Oh god. Steve was almost regretting this already. Mr Barnes stood in front of him, a weird glint in his eye.

He did his best to smile. “Hi. I’m here to see Bucky?”

This seemed to make Mr Barnes very happy. “Of course,” he said, standing aside. “Come on in.”

Immediately, it felt so awkward. Steve had been expecting for Bucky to come answer the door, and skip them this part. The house was very clearly Bucky’s parents’ house – not that there was anything wrong with that, but there was almost no sign that there was anyone else there.

“I did think that my daughter might be here today,” Mr Barnes said as he led Steve further into the house. This was another thing that Steve hadn’t been expecting – he had thought that Mr Barnes would lead him to where Bucky was, and leave it at that. “I think she’s busy with her friends, though – I guess you and Bucky will be left to your own devices.” He gave an awkward chuckle.

Steve smiled tensely, mostly to join in. It wasn’t that he didn’t like Mr Barnes, but everything about this felt like he was trying a little too hard. Sometimes he thought that Mr Barnes wasn’t sure whether he and Bucky were just friends or something more – and it didn’t help that Steve himself wasn’t entirely too sure either.

“He’s probably up in his room,” Mr Barnes said, sounding even more like he was talking about a teenager. “It’s just up the stairs and to the left.”

Nodding in thanks, Steve escaped up the stairs. Maybe it was the fact that stairs were strenuous, or maybe it was the excitement that came with seeing Bucky again, but by the time that he got to the top, his heart was pounding and his head was filled with images of how adorable Bucky probably looked right now.

Okay, maybe that part was just the excitement.

He could feel how flushed his face was right now, but hopefully it would just look like he had been affected by the stairs.

All of the doors upstairs were closed. It really didn’t help with Steve’s dilemma about which one to pick. He turned to his death. “Which one do you think it is?” He whispered, trying to stay quiet.

His death said nothing – but their skeletal hand pointed at one of them.

Well, like they said, woe betide the man whose death showed them the path and they ignored it.

Taking a chance, Steve pushed open the door, half prepared to scram.

Then he saw what was going on. Bucky was on his bed, eyes closed, looking a little like he was asleep. He was facing the wall – and on the other side of the room sat his death, hovering just above a chair that sat in the corner.

It was a pretty normal view of a man sleeping.

In fact, as Steve crept closer, he noticed the fact that Bucky looked calmer than he had done… well, in the whole time Steve had known him.

Steve’s death floated over to be beside Bucky’s. mirroring them, Steve stepped closer to Bucky. He didn’t want to wake him up (it wasn’t like he hadn’t noticed the texts he’d received late at night), knowing that he should be allowed to sleep for as long as he liked.

And so he sat carefully down on the end of the bed, slowly and quietly.

Bucky didn’t stir. That was good – and Steve curled his legs up, ready to wait it out. Right now his friend needed to sleep – even if they were meant to be meeting up right now.

That lasted for a while – Steve was perfectly happy to spend time with Bucky like this, even if they weren’t talking. A few times Bucky stirred a little – even rolling over at one point – but he didn’t wake up. He must have gone to sleep really late, Steve thought.

And so he entertained himself by making notes of potential new projects he could start, and sending Sam memes that he found on twitter – it was surprisingly nice to just sit and be quiet in his presence. Even having their deaths there didn’t change things – although that was mostly because Bucky was still asleep.

Steve was so engrossed in what he was doing that he didn’t even notice that Bucky’s eyes had opened. At least, he didn’t, until he felt Bucky’s foot pushing against him from under the covers, wiggling around like he wasn’t sure what was going on.

Looking at him, Steve saw the way that Bucky was frowning sleepily at him. It was… cute.

“Hey there,” Steve said, trying to keep from being too energetic right away. “Did you have a good sleep?”

Bucky blinked confusedly at him. then, “I – what?” Steve could see the comprehension dawning in his eyes – and then he scrambled to sit up. “What are you doing here?”

“We were meant to be meeting, remember?” Steve said. He could have easily been irritated that Bucky had clearly forgotten about all of this – but he just couldn’t bring himself to be, not when everything had been fine so far.

Bucky frowned. “We… oh, right?”

Steve saw the very moment where full realisation settled on him. The guilt practically rolled off of him in waves, and he watched as he grabbed his phone and began looking at it in dismay.

“What is it?” Steve asked, leaning a little closer.

“I accidentally set my alarm for pm instead of am,” Bucky sighed. He sounded so sad about it that Steve couldn’t resist slipping an arm around Bucky’s shoulders in commiseration.

“It’s okay,” he said, trying to make Bucky feel better as best as he could.

Bucky looked up at him with sad eyes. “I only meant to have a short nap,” he whined. “Ugh, this too embarrassing.” With that, he buried his head in his hands.

It was funny, Steve thought, how somehow this situation was less awkward than seeing Bucky’s dad outside of a landlord-tenant context.

Steve patted his head, trying not to make him feel any worse.

“Well what do you want to do?” He asked. The quicker they moved on from this conversation, probably the better.

Bucky didn’t look like he believed that Steve didn’t mind what had happened, but he sat up anyway. The red pillow creases on his cheek, coupled with the hair on that side of his head sticking up every which way, only added to that ‘just woken up’ look that he was sporting.

“Um –“ he said, looking around, like he was looking for inspiration. “Wanna watch a movie?”

Steve had no objections to that – and as Bucky went to set it up, he was impressed at the amount of services he had a subscription to.

(They spent the entire movie talking, even once it was playing. It was one which Steve had never seen, but despite this he found himself not caring about that. Unlike the last time they saw each other, Bucky seemed a little less quiet. It wasn’t a conversation, per se – but the dry comments he made had Steve enjoying the movie more than he would have done otherwise.)

Steve couldn’t have told you what they ended up doing later. Time seemed to pass in a strange way, seeming to stretch out and yet not matter at all. He didn’t know how much time had passed since he got there – checking the time just didn’t seem to be important right now.

How was it possible to enjoy the company of a person this much?

Steve didn’t know the answer, but he did know that by the time he left, he was happier than he’d been in a long time.

**

Bucky and Steve ended up meeting up a lot more times after that first time. Each time, Bucky ended up thinking more and more that he wanted to date Steve – it was like every time he saw Steve, the cuter he looked, and the more his heart raced. And the more he wondered whether it was going to be worth asking Steve out of any kind of date.

There was one meetup where Steve had suggested that they go out for lunch. At the moment that Steve had asked, Bucky’s heart had stuttered. He had imagined going on a proper date with Steve for a long while – but it had turned out to be that he wanted to test a buffet bar and knew that Bucky needed to eat more.

He’d been happy enough to go along – but had spent the entire evening pining over Steve, watching him stuff more salad than Bucky thought possible into his tiny body. It had been a good evening, on the whole – but only made Bucky see what he wished their relationship could be.

It only made Bucky realise more and more that the crush he was harbouring for Steve was only growing bigger and bigger. And, if he wasn’t careful, he was going to find it difficult to stay on top of it.

Which led him to an afternoon in Steve’s apartment, a lazy, comfortable time.

It still amazed Bucky that he had the same reaction to seeing Steve every time. If anything, it had gotten stronger.

“I’ll be back in a minute,” Steve said, standing up from the couch.

Bucky nodded, resting his head on his palm. He watched Steve as he left to go into the kitchen… something which he was aware maybe looked a little over the top. He shouldn’t really be staring so much, but he really couldn’t help it. Steve was just so mesmerising that he couldn’t take his eyes off of him.

Being in his company made Bucky feel more settled. Less on edge. Less hyperaware of the location of his death. His presence was soothing, something Bucky wanted to keep around him for as long as possible.

But having Steve away for a moment made Bucky remember about what he’d planned to do on coming here. Of course, it was also to meet up with Steve, to spend the day together. The most important reason had been to ask Steve on a date. A proper one, not just a friend hangout.

Nerves tingled through him at the thought. This was something that he had wanted for a long time now. Even the idea was enough to excite.

He was brought back to his thoughts about Steve by Steve himself, ironically.

“So I’ve got my laptop,” Steve said, coming back into the room, swinging said laptop from his hand. “Do you have anything in particular that you want to watch?”

Bucky snapped back to the present. “I don’t mind,” he said. He didn’t want to name any shows – not when he didn’t know what the popular ones actually were.

“Cool,” Steve said distractedly. He began to scroll though the myriad of options there were on there. Bucky shuddered internally at the idea of trying to choose by himself. “What about this one?”

He turned the screen so that Bucky could see it. Bucky was meant to be looking at what was on the screen, he knew, but… He couldn’t help but get distracted by the way that Steve’s long, elegant artists hands wrapped around the laptop. It was difficult to focus when it didn’t seem to be the most important thing at that time.

“Sure?” Bucky said, sounding a little more unsure than he’d wanted to. Steve didn’t seem to notice it, beginning to set everything up.

It was at this point that he realised that if he didn’t do it now, he would have to wait until they were done with the tv show to do it.

There could be no hesitation.

Bucky pulled together all of his courage. If he didn’t so this now, then he might never be able to get the chance again. “Steve,” he said, trying to get the other’s attention.

Steve looked up. “Yeah?”

“Do – do you want to go to dinner with me?” Bucky only stuttered a little.

Cocking his head to the side, Steve said, “yeah, sure. When?” He sounded light-hearted, and that made Bucky feel better.

“Uh – I don’t know,” Bucky said, mentally flipping through his schedule. And also Steve’s schedule. “Thursday night?”

Steve seemed to think about this for a moment. “Yeah, I think that should work pretty well,” he said eventually. “Where do you want to go? Is there any particular occasion for the dinner?”

Bucky froze. Steve didn’t realise this was meant to be a date. Shit. Should he just go along with it? Pretend like this was what he had meant all along?

No. that would be bad, and Bucky dismissed the idea immediately.

“Uh – yeah, I was hoping it would be a date.” He looked down at the couch as he said it. Looking at his best friend while he was about to reject him didn’t seem like a very good idea.

Nobody said anything for a minute.

Bucky felt Steve’s hand on the bottom of his chin, lifting his head up. Bucky did so – reluctantly. “Hey,” Steve said, “look at me.” It took a lot for Bucky to look at him. but, when he did it was worth it. Steve’s face was soft, affection written all over it.

“I would love to go on a date with you.”

Bucky’s heart just about melted. Then Steve’s hand reached over and held his – and then he was flying, his heart soaring. He gripped Steve’s hand tightly to ground himself.

“Thank you,” he whispered.

**

Bucky eyed up his death nervously. They were floating in the corner, as they usually were during these sessions. Usually having them around

“Was there ever a time when I enjoyed having my death around?” He repeated. Michelle nodded. It had been such an unexpected question that Bucky had been caught off guard by it. He didn’t like to talk too much about his death directly in these sessions – not when they were right there. It was one of the reasons why he avoided those questions in the first place.

He glanced over at his death again before answering. “I… yeah, I guess.”

Michelle cocked her head to the side, and made a note in her notepad. “And how long ago was that?”

Bucky began to pick at the material of his pants. “Before it happened,” He muttered. He didn’t want to have to specify what ‘it’ was, and it was sure to be the next question -

“Would you say that you felt ‘normal’, back then?” The air quotes around Michelle’s head were literal, but Bucky understood what she meant.

He had nodded almost before he realised what he was doing. Everything had changed at that one point – it wasn’t like it had been a slow process at all.

Michelle sighed. “So there’s something stopping you from going back to that point, then? This hasn’t always been the case?”

Bucky knew full well that she was referring to the people who had issues with their deaths right from the start. Those tended to be the people who had suffered major incidents as children – which Bucky certainly hadn’t been one of. But in order for her to know that, he would have to actually tell her.

Putting his hands in his lap, he tried to find words for it. “No,” he started, “I haven’t always been like this.” It was the first time he’d said those words out loud. Even to himself.

Michelle’s face remained entirely straight. She wrote something down in her notebook, and it only made Bucky slightly nervous to think about that admission being committed to paper.

It was the only significant thing that was said during the whole session. Michelle didn’t push for Bucky to say any more – although he got the feeling that she was curious for her own reasons.

She did ask other questions – but most of them were variants on ones she’d asked before, about what he was doing with his time. They were easy to answer, his brain on autopilot while his mind wandered. It was enough to have made one big confession for this session – he couldn’t handle much more than that.

Even once the session was over, and they were saying their goodbyes, Bucky didn’t feel quite all there. He did feel lighter, in some way, but he didn’t feel entirely stable in any of his actions.

He didn’t even flinch when his death followed him out of the office. He didn’t have the energy to have that level of fear inside him.

**

“You seem happier today,” Steve said, amused. “You don’t seem half as distracted as you have been lately.”

Becca grinned at him shamelessly. “You’re right,” she said, putting her pen down. “Some of the stuff that’s been worrying me has gone away.”

It was nice to see her so happy, Steve thought. She had seemed to be distracted and sad the last few times he had seen her – it was a welcome change to have her be upbeat.

“Oh yeah? Want to tell me about any of it?” Steve asked, trying to be encouraging. He put his pen down, not expecting to be working much for the next few minutes.

Unlike other time, Becca cocked her head to the side, seemingly thinking about her answer. “I don’t want to say too much,” she said slowly, “it’s not really my story to tell. But – but my brother is happier, and that’s the main thing.”

Most of her grievances tended to be over her brother. From what Steve had heard about him, he didn’t really… _do_ much, and it made Becca very worried about him. Even though he didn’t know the man personally, Steve found himself feeling sorry for him.

“I’m glad to hear it,” Steve said, only feeling a little bit curious about what the details might be. He wasn’t close enough to Becca to be nosy if she didn’t want to share.

Becca smiled at him - there was no secrets in it, only proper happiness.

Then Steve glanced down at the page of notes in front of him. They still had quite a lot to get through, and some of it catch up from previous sessions when Becca had been more distracted. “So, uh – what do you want to work on next? There’s –“

“But what about you?” Becca interrupted him, mid-sentence and all.

Steve blinked. “What?”

“You’ve been happier too, recently.” If Steve hadn’t known better, he might have thought that she was trying to just tease him. But this was proving to be one of the most serious conversations that they’d had in any of the meetings they’d had.

Of course – it stood to reason that yeah, he had been happier recently. A smile came to his face even thinking about Bucky. “I – yeah, I recently got a boyfriend,” Steve said, feeling a small amount of colour coming to his face.

Somehow Becca looked almost surprised at that. “Oh! Oh, that’s great,” she said, eyes widening.

Steve chuckled. “What’s up?” He was pretty sure that she wasn’t homophobic, but you could never tell why someone might be bothered by something like that.

“I just – I guess for a moment there I forgot that you had a life outside of college,” she said, laughing at herself.

Steve found himself chuckling along despite himself – it was something that he had encountered before with being a TA, with some students practically refusing to accept that Steve might have things going on outside of his teaching of them. “You’re not the only one,” he said, shaking his head.

For a moment he was very tempted to tell her more about Bucky, to show her a picture maybe. Btu then he remembered that technically she was his student, and they were probably already pushing the boundaries of how much they should be sharing with each other.

“Sorry,” Becca said, not really sounding sorry at all. “I guess I just forgot that you were a real person for a moment.”

Snorting, Steve slapped her playfully on the arm. “I’m not just a teaching machine, you know.”

Becca looked pointedly down at the sheet full of facts that Steve had printed off for her. She said nothing, but her point was made.

“I’m not,” Steve said, feeling a little like he was trying to swim upstream (and swimming was difficult enough for him at the best of times).

“Of course,” Becca said, dropping the subject.

The rest of the session was… reasonably productive. It was easy enough for them to transition back to their usual teaching banter – Steve didn’t think that it was too different, at least. Although it was arguable that they had gotten closer in this session, it also seemed that things were much the same as they had ever been.

It was Steve’s favourite thing, to have things be as they normally were. To have Becca be his student, and nothing more.

**

Bucky gulped. He was stood outside the restaurant, three days after he had asked Steve on a date. This was something he’d wanted for a long while now. So now why was he so nervous?

He checked his texts again. There was one from Becca, wishing him luck. There was nothing from Steve, though.

Then he spotted a familiar blond head weaving its way through the crowd.

“Steve!” He said loudly, waving a hand. Unfortunately, besides getting Steve’s attention, it also got everyone else’s attention too. That was unintended, and immediately made Bucky feel ten times more uncomfortable.

Thankfully Steve didn’t seem to mind, and they made their way into the restaurant without any more mishaps.

The server sat them at a table right in the centre of the room, and it was fine. It only made Bucky a little bit anxious to be surrounded by so many deaths. It was fine.

There was one slightly moment where Bucky realised that this might be more awkward than he wanted if nobody was talking – and then he realised that he was going to have to be the one to start the conversation.

Taking a deep breath, he said, “So what’s going to college like?” It was something that had somehow not come up in all the time they’d talked.

Steve blinked. “Oh, it’s great. I mean, it was hard to afford it, but it was worth it.” He smiled.

“What did you study?” Bucky asked, before realising what a stupid question that was. “For undergrad, I mean,” he added hastily.

Steve didn’t seem to notice. “Oh, the same thing I do now.” He leaned forward a little, pleasantly engaged in the conversation. “I majored in fine arts, and minored in art history.” To be fair, that explained a lot.

“Really?” Bucky asked. “That’s so cool! It does explain all the art in your apartment though.”

Steve nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah, you see how it makes sense? I had so many assignments that that alone would have been enough to fill a whole gallery.” He snorted. “And that’s not counting all the things I’ve worked on for my own amusement.”

“Shit, really?” Bucky couldn’t help but ask.

Steve shrugged, looking proud but humble. “Yeah, I just cant help myself.”

Bucky sighed. “I wish I had a hobby like that.” He wasn’t really that upset about it, but it was still true.

“There’s no reason why you can’t,” Steve said. He looked entirely earnest about it, too, and Bucky’s heart fluttered.

He shook his head anyway. “Ah, well I was always shit at art in school,” he said, almost disappointed that he was going to have to disappoint Steve.

“Really?” Steve actually looked surprised.

“Yeah, I was never much for anything in school,” Bucky admitted.

When their food arrived, conversation dropped off. It wasn’t awkward, though. In a way, Bucky almost liked that more. Steve was good company for him in that they were able to have quiet moments together a lot. This was the same as that. No different to how they had spent time together before.

**

“Look how cute this is!” Steve heard Bucky say from the other side of the store. It was faint, but it was definitely him.

He picked up the chicken fillet that he had been eyeing up, and made his way over to where he thought Bucky might be. He had left him in the candy aisle (he hadn’t hesitated to make jokes that Bucky was like a kid in a candy shop there), but when he looked down there, he wasn’t there.

He looked down the next aisle, and the next, but there was still no sign of Bucky.

It took the next one before he saw him – the one that had all the Halloween decorations in it. It was like a mouldy pumpkin had thrown up in there – the entire thing was orange and black, and very festive. If Steve had been one to celebrate Halloween, then maybe he would have revelled in it – in the same way that Bucky clearly was right now.

Steve smiled as he watched his boyfriend flit around the aisle, seeming enamoured with everything he touched.

It was only when Bucky turned and saw him that Steve felt the need to go up to him. Bucky stood there as he walked up, looking ever so slightly sheepish. “Hey,” he said, “look what I found?”

Steve laughed. “What were you thinking of buying?”

Bucky said nothing – but his eyes darted over to a small orange cat, sat on the shelf nearby.

“That one?” It was only one small thing, but Steve would be more than happy to treat him to it.

He nodded. Steve picked it up and put it in his basket – along with a plastic pumpkin nearby for good measure. Bucky grinned at him as he did. “There’s just something about the trappings of Halloween that I love,” he said.

"Well I can't relate, but I’ll support you anyway," Steve said, amused. "Is there anything else you want while we're here?"

It had seemed like an innocent enough question at the time, but Bucky spent the next ten minutes debating the pros and cons of the majority of the items in the aisle. It was honestly sort of endearing - and Steve found that he didn't mind when Bucky put three more orange pumpkin-themed items in the basket.

"So what are you going to do for Halloween?" Bucky asked as they left the store, bags in hand. The wind buffeted them the moment they left - and much as Steve wanted to answer instantly, he wanted to wait until he could physically open his mouth again. He found himself jealous of his death in moments like these, where their non-corporealness came in handy - even intense winds affected them little, and they glided behind them with only a slight movement of their cloaks from the wind.

As soon as Steve wasn't risking being blown away, he answered. "Well when I lived with my mom, we didn't really do that much - busy being sick and all most of the time - and even now there isn't much I can do. It's not like I’m going to bother to go up and down the stairs answering the door all night, so I leave it to my other neighbours to answer the door if anyone comes calling."

Bucky looked affronted. "You mean you don't do anything for the best day of the year?" He asked, sounding like Steve had insulted his very person.

Steve shrugged. "I dunno, it was just never a priority."

"Well you're definitely going to have to come to a Barnes Halloween party then," Bucky replied firmly.

It was such an ominous statement - and yet, two weeks later, when Steve found himself dressing up as a death for Halloween, he found himself wondering just what it was going to involve.

He checked his texts just one last time. He had asked Bucky earlier if there was anything he needed to bring, any way he could help them set up. Naturally the only response was 'you'll see' - to which Steve's follow up texts questioning everything about it had gone unanswered. It wasn't worrying at all.

There was still nothing on that end. The only thing that he could be sure of was that it was definitely at Bucky's house, and that it was definitely happening at 7. Which meant that he needed to leave sharpish if he wanted any kind of chance at beating the holiday traffic.

His cloak swished around him as he walked around his apartment, gathering all the things that he was going to need.

Most of it wasn't actually all that necessary - it was unlikely that the Barneses were going to make him pay for snacks while he was there - but it felt right to have them on him.

Then he set off, one death after another. As far as he was concerned, it was the best low-effort Halloween costume. All you really needed was a loose black sheet and you could pass as having done a decent amount of work on it.

As he walked down the street in the direction of the subway, he saw many, many other people in the same costume as him. It didn't make him feel bad that he wasn't being 'original' - it was an outfit as old as time, it wasn't like anyone was going to care.

The subway ride to the Barnes residence felt short and familiar this time around. He had been there often enough in the past month to know it well, to the point where he barely needed to pay attention to the other stops they were passing on the way.

There were so many other people packed onto the subway. He didn’t know why he hadn’t twigged that it would be busy tonight – it was probably to do with never having been out on Halloween before. It was so cramped in the car that everyone’s deaths were floating above them, like the darkest of clouds.

It was almost comforting, Steve thought - like they were a layer of protection for them, for him.

There was an air of joviality in the subway that night - the rush that came from knowing that everyone around you was going off to do very similar things. It wasn't something that Steve experienced very often, but it was sort of nice, nonetheless. He couldn't exactly complain about having not before, not when it had been his own choice.

The crowds pushed him further and further into the middle of the car as more people attempted to squeeze into the train. It was an impressive feat, in some ways - that they were able to find another two square foot of space to stand in, when he had thought that it was as cramped as it was going to get already.

It wasn't something enjoyable though, not really. It was exciting to begin with, but as his stop grew nearer, he realised that he was going to have to get closer to the doors, or risk not being able to get off.

This was one of the times where he was grateful for his small size. Squeezing himself through tiny gaps, he slid over to the doors, people's costumes and the ends of deaths' cloaks occasionally draping over his face. It was... uncomfortable, to say the least.

He reached the outer reaches of the car just in the nick of time. Jumping out and breathing in that slightly-less-sweaty air in the subway station, he was at least glad that now he could take a deep breath without worrying that he was going to take up too much room.

Once he was out of the station and had signal again, he checked his phone. There were no messages from Bucky - but he had sent a photo, just one. It was far too blurry for Steve to make out whatever it might have meant to be of, and honestly he suspected that it might not have been meant to be sent in the first place.

He ignored it - there was a good chance that bringing attention to it might just end up upsetting Bucky even more.

The walk to Bucky's house was a lot quieter than the walk to his subway stop had been. It was still busy - but the demographic was entirely different. Whereas where he had been, the majority of people had been young, looking to go out and party, here they were all small children.

It was honestly sort of adorable.

As Steve watched the kids, being encouraged by parents to go ring the doorbells by themselves, and running around (probably already full of candy), he had a sort of vision of the childhood he should have had. One which was full of this kind of childhood innocence, instead of being full of hospital visits. There had been one particularly memorable Halloween where Steve had got dressed up, having convinced his mom that he deserved to get to go out - and then having a full-blown asthma attack at the first house they tried to go to and needing to be rushed to hospital. It was something that Steve could almost laugh about now, but at the time it had been entirely devastating.

He tried to not get too distracted on his way. He _did_ try to make a mental tally of how many similar costumes he could see - there were plenty of supermen, and bananas, but not that many deaths. It almost made him feel more validated in his choices.

(At one point a young boy looked at him and almost looked scared. It amused Steve for a second - and then he began to wonder if perhaps this child had been through something similar to whatever Bucky had. deaths didn't scare many.)

By the time he reached the Barnes household, he was beginning to feel a little sweaty. There were at least three thick layers of fabric on him, and despite the chilly night, he still had warmed up quickly.

He knocked on the door. He couldn't really hear anything, but that didn't have to mean much - there could be plenty going on in there without sounds needing to escape out.

He saw a flurry of activity through the glass of the door. It was almost impossible to tell what any of it was, really, but he also couldn't help but think that perhaps he shouldn't look into it too much.

He was just beginning to cool down when the door opened. There stood Bucky, dressed up as a vampire. He was grinning already, fake fangs showing, clearly having expected him. It was great to see - until his smile faded slightly. Steve watched Bucky's eyes roving all over his costume. For the first time, it seemed like maybe this hadn't been the best of ideas after all.

"Do you like it?" Steve asked nervously.

Bucky took a second to reply. "I - it's certainly very good," he said. If Steve hadn't known better, he wouldn't have noticed the way that Bucky avoided answering the actual question - or the way that he was beginning to angle himself away.

Using needing to go in as an excuse, Steve flipped his hood back, hoping that it would lessen the realistic effect. "It's cold out here," he chuckled, stamping his legs for effect.

That seemed to snap Bucky out of it. "Right, right," he said, stepping aside so that Steve could come in.

He did so gratefully, having begun to get chilly despite his earlier warmth (a side effect of being so skinny).

Now that he was out of the night air, Steve could begin to focus on other things. There was nobody else about, and that meant that he could get away with kisses, according to Bucky's own rules.

"Hi," he said, grinning.

Bucky seemed to get what he was going for, and leaned down for a kiss.

"So what was with that picture earlier?" Steve asked.

Seeing Bucky's embarrassed face go red made it almost worth it. "That wasn't me," he said defensively, "I left my phone out, and my sister tried to send a picture to you, I think. I mean, I got to it before she could take one properly, but it still managed to slip though. sorry about that."

Well, that did seem to make some sense. Steve nodded. "Right, because I thought you'd just had a major misjudgement of what counted as 'in focus'."

The redness of Bucky's face didn't shift, but he laughed - a good sign that he wasn't too embarrassed.

"Shall we go further in?" Bucky said, changing the topic.

"We shall," Steve said, allowing Bucky to have this one. The kitchen table that he could see was already half covered in platters of food, each wrapped up with saran wrap. Honestly it looked pretty good, and with the smell of food hanging in the air, it actually made Steve a little hungry.

"Food is for later," Bucky said - and Steve whipped his focus guiltily from the food to his boyfriend.

Said boyfriend looked amused - he had caught him in the act of being hungry, and that was just too much.

"Shut up," Steve said, walking on ahead. There were two doors at the end of the room, and he headed for the one that he knew led to the sunroom, as that was where they often hung out.

"Everyone's in the living room," Bucky's voice came from behind him - and so he changed course like that was where he had meant to go all along.

They did enter the room together, Bucky at Steve's back. Suddenly, with no warning, he felt nervous - despite the fact that he had met the Barnes parents many times before. This would be the first time that they really had to spend time together for a set amount of time, and Steve was beginning to wonder if he should have insisted that he and Bucky do something of their own tonight.

Fortunately, so far the only people in there were Mr and Mrs Barnes.

He was greeted warmly - much more warmly than he would have been before, as simply their tenant, he thought. Still, as Mrs Barnes insisted on giving him a hug, he found himself enjoying the feeling of being part of the family, in a way.

Steve didn’t partake much in the talking, but Mr and Mrs Barnes talked enough for all of them. He was happy to watch them talk with each other, and with Bucky.

“Where’s Becca? Do you know?” Mrs Barnes asked.

"Becca was annoying me all evening, but I don't know where she's gone off to now," Bucky said.

"I’m sure she'll turn up when we get the food out," Mr Barnes said. "I -"

The doorbell ringing interrupted him. Before any of them could get up to answer it, the sound of footsteps thudding down the stairs reached them. "I guess that's her?" Steve said.

Bucky nodded. "I think so. she loves being the one to hand candy out."

They all listened to the sounds of small children at the door. It was only ever so slightly awkward - Steve didn’t know whether the Barnes parents also loved this part of Halloween, it wasn't made clear.

The sound of the door slamming closed marked the end of the trick or treaters, for now.

There was another moment of silence - and then the sound of the door to this room opening.

"Speak of the devil," Bucky said.

Steve schooled his face into his pleasant 'meeting the family' expression, turned around, and...

There was Becca. Even with copious amounts of face paint on, it was still undeniably her - the face that he had seen once a week for the past two months right here, in Bucky's home.

They stared at each other for a second.

"_Steve_?" Becca asked, the gentle paint on her face warping slightly as her face screwed up in confusion.

Steve swallowed. "Yes?" He said, trying to control the fact that he also was rather confused about what was going on. All the facts were beginning to slot into place - Becca telling him that her brother had been sad for a while, and that said brother's life had begun to improve coincidentally around the time that he and Bucky had got together...

"What? How do you two know each other?"

Steve looked at Becca for a second longer - neither of them seeming to know what they should say.

then he turned to Bucky. "Becca goes to my university," he began, "I... I’m her TA."

It was almost amusing to see the comprehension flowing over Bucky's face. At least, it would have been, if it hadn't been so horrifically awkward. Becca didn't seem to have gotten any better - if anything she seemed to be feeling the awkwardness much more keenly than him. Understandable, given the tiger onesie she currently had on.

“Well isn’t this nice?”

Steve jumped – he’d completely forgotten that Mrs Barnes was even still in the room. He looked at her – she didn’t look like she had realised how awkward the rest of them were finding all of this. She was smiling at them, and Steve realised that she really did think that this was a nice thing.

“Come on,” Bucky said, standing up. “Let’s go to my room.”

Steve stood up with him, nodding.

It was difficult to tell what Becca was thinking, what with all the paint on her face, but she didn’t argue. She did stay silent though, and that was strange. In all the time that he’d known Becca, he hadn’t known her to be quiet for more than five minutes or so.

As they walked back through the house to the stairs, there was the sound of more knocking on the door. Steve looked at Bucky. “Should we answer it?” He asked quietly, leaning into Bucky. “Do we –“

Bucky bit his lip.

Thankfully, the next moment they heard Bucky’s dad announcing that he would be the one to deal with the trick or treaters.

Becca was already halfway up the stairs, having not stopped when Bucky and Steve did. With Mr Barnes being the one to deal with children, there was no need for them to stick around, and clearly Becca had been the first to realise that.

They scrambled after her. Steve had no idea what was about to go down (his mind was still racing a little because of this clashing of worlds), but he wasn’t sure that it was going to be fun at all.

The walking into the room all together was nerve wracking. Possibly more than anything else.

The moment the door was closed, leaving them alone in Bucky’s room, Becca burst out giggling. It wasn’t a happy laugh – it was one that spoke of how ridiculous this situation was.

Bucky made a beeline for his bed. The way that he hit the bed made Steve think that he was just as weirded out by all of this as he was – not that he hadn’t already figured it out.

Then Steve realised that Bucky wasn’t just giving Becca the scared, what’s going on here look – he was giving Steve it too.

Becca was still having her freak out moment in the corner, and Steve took the opportunity to lean down to Bucky and ask, “what’s worrying you?”

Bucky looked up at him – and for the first time, Steve realised that his eyes were teary. “What did you two talk about?”

Steve blinked. That seemed so random that momentarily he had no idea what to respond to it. “What? We – when?”

Leaning closer, Bucky said, “when you had your meetings at college. What… what stuff did you talk about?”

“Uh… college things? Becca was a student of mine, she came to my office sometimes. That’s how we know each other.” Steve didn’t know what else Bucky wanted him to say.

Bucky looked at him with wild eyes. “Are – really? Because – I mean, I just thought –“

“Thought _what_?”

“Thought that maybe you’d... talked about me. I – I don’t know…” Bucky’s words were stuttered.

Honestly Steve still didn’t know what had got him so worked up. There was something about the way that he couldn’t get his words out in a coherent sentence that made Steve think that he really didn’t know what he was trying to say, either. “You… think we talked?” It was such an odd thing.

“About me? Did you talk about me?” Bucky spat out.

“I – no? We didn’t even know the other knew you. We couldn’t possibly have talked about you?” Steve said incredulously.

Bucky visibly relaxed. “Okay.”

Steve blinked. That was what Bucky had been worried about?

“What are you two talking about?” Becca sounded suspicious. Steve couldn’t really blame her for that.

Guiltily, they turned to look at her.

“Uh - don’t worry about it,” Bucky said.

Steve nodded, backing Bucky up. “Yeah, everything’s fine.”

Becca looked at them suspiciously. “Okay, if you’re sure…”

“Yeah, we’re sure,” Bucky said quickly. Maybe too quickly, Steve thought – but it was too late, there was nothing he could do about it.

Becca cleared her throat. “So how long have you two been together, again?”

Steve shared a glance with Bucky.

“About a month?” Steve said.

Bucky nodded. “Yeah, something like that.”

The fact that neither of them could remember the exact amount of time probably didn’t bode well.

“Riiiight,” Becca said, beginning to frown. “Yeah, I guess that does add up. You didn’t tell me much about him though – I totally could have figured it out, you know.” She looked very confident in her assessment.

“Honestly I believe it,” said Steve before he could think it through more.

“Pfft, no you couldn’t,” Bucky said instantly. “Remember that time you were convinced there were fairies in the attic?”

“I was sevEN-“

Steve watched in mild horror as the two began to tussle, half wondering whether he needed to separate them physically. The only thing stopping him from doing just that was the giggles that both of them were emitting.

It wasn’t long before they let go of each other, flushed and significantly happier than they had been at the beginning.

Bucky cleared his throat. “You know you don’t have to be involved in every aspect of my life, though,” he said gently.

Becca shrugged. “I know, but you know I like to be as much as possible.” She said this so nonchalantly that Steve was almost caught off guard by the overt tenderness.

“Yeah, you’re right.” Bucky looked slightly guilty.

Steve cleared his throat, catching Bucky’s attention. “I don’t mind how much you tell her Bucky, it’s okay,” he said.

“Yeah, that’s not what I’m worried about,” Bucky replied.

Becca nodded. “Yeah, it’s the teasing that’s bad,” she said.

Steve tried to not let on the fact that he still didn’t really get where they were going with this. “Yeah… do whatever you want, it’s fine.”

Bucky shook his head. “Well only do what’s comfortable for you.”

Steve put his head on Bucky’s shoulder, and Bucky leaned down to kiss his head. In response, Becca made vomiting noises – which was actually sort of hilarious.

Bucky laughed, breaking the moment – and whirled around to confront Becca. Pulling her closer to him, he pulled her into a headlock. Becca put up a half-hearted fight, but she seemed to be too busy laughing to actually try to get out from under Bucky’s arm.

(Seeing this made more sense to Steve. He had never spent much time around a pair of siblings before, but he knew the two of them didn’t hate each other enough for any of this to be serious.)

Eventually the two of them let go of each other, with only a few hits thrown in for good measure. (Steve only felt a little left out.)

Bucky coughed. “So are we good? You’re not mad? Or too weirded out?” He didn’t sound very nervous about it, which made Steve feel better.

Steve nodded. “Yeah, if it’s too weird for you I’ll totally get it, you shouldn’t feel obligated to keep coming to my office h-“

“Are you kidding?” Becca interrupted. “Now I’m going to come every office hour armed with embarrassing baby photos!”

Steve’s eyes widened. “Yes, please do!”

Bucky scowled at her. “If you do that I’ll murder you in your sleep,” he said.

“Not if I kill you first,” Becca said back. There was no fire in her voice.

The siblings stared at each other silently. Steve watched on, silently amused.

“Yeah, we’re good though,” Becca said, breaking the moment.

Steve sighed. He hadn’t thought that they weren’t going to make things work out, but there had been a small amount of worry there.

Bucky chuckled to himself. “Yeah, I thought you were gonna demand that we break up so we don’t make college awkward for you.”

Becca shrugged. “It was tempting,” she teased, “but I wouldn’t want to make Steve sad.”

Bucky rolled his eyes good-naturedly.

“Yeah, haven’t you realised that I’m the important one here?” Steve asked.

“Shush you,” Bucky said to Becca.

“I hate you,” Becca replied.

Bucky shook his head. “I’m going to head down now.”

“Oh, I’ll join you,” Steve said, standing up to stand by Bucky.

“Hey Steve, can I talk to you? Alone?”

Steve turned around. “Sure,” he said carefully. When Bucky gave him a questioning look, he tried to make it clear that he didn’t mind talking to Becca, whatever this was going to be about. And, with that, he nodded for Bucky to leave them alone.

Beginning to feel slightly uncomfortable in his cloak, Steve tried to resist itching at the parts of his skin that were exposed to the cloak material. He didn’t want to make Becca think that he was nervous.

The sound of the door closing was loud to Steve, even with his ears.

“So what did you want to talk about?” Steve asked, when Becca didn’t say anything.

She still didn’t talk – but she did move to sit next to him on the bed. Steve stiffened.

“I just… I want to make sure that you’re good to Bucky.” Becca bit her lip – and despite her words, Steve saw the steely glint in her eye that showed how much she meant it.

“I am, I promise.” Steve suddenly really felt the role reversal they were going through here. He had never had the experience of being intimidated by one of his students, but he imagined that this was a lot like it.

Becca swallowed. “Good. Because – because if you’re not, I…. I don’t know what I’ll do, but you won’t like it.”

Steve believed it. “I promise,” he repeated.

“Good.”

The rest of the evening was less stressful. Once they’d established that they were all on the same page, it was much easier for the three of them to get along easily. They never did re-join Bucky’s parents, choosing to keep to themselves for ease of conversation.

Steve had already known that he got along well with Becca – but to talk to her in an informal setting? It made things much better than they already had.

It was also interesting to see Bucky interacting with someone other than Steve. (particularly one so focussed on embarrassing him. The amount of anecdotes that she had about their childhood was impressive.)

But it wasn’t bad, either. Even the unfortunate way it had played out didn’t seem so bad once it was over – and Becca didn’t seem to be holding any grudges about it, which Steve was very grateful for.

If anything, he felt closer to Becca after it.

And he was glad he went.

**

Bucky stuttered out his coffee order. It had been too long since he’d just gone out casually to buy coffee by himself – it was something that he hadn’t even realised he’d missed until he went out to do it.

As the barista turned away to make the coffee, Bucky stepped to the side of the counter.

It was the normal place to wait. It should have only made him feel more normal. And… it did, but in an unexpected way. The coffee shop had filled up in the time since he got there. There were quite a few people waiting in line behind him – and with people came their deaths.

And for the first time in a long time, it didn’t bother Bucky.

For a second he didn’t even register it – and then he remembered that he usually reacted very differently to that kind of situation.

He blinked.

There were… at least five deaths in the shop. And that wasn’t counting his own.

Maybe it was the way that the warmth of the shop didn’t let through any of the death-related cold. Maybe it was all of Steve’s pep talks about how deaths were meant to comfort you.

Maybe he was just sick of being scared of his own death.

For the first time in a long time, he didn’t have any physical reaction as he looked at his death.

He couldn’t explain it.

He couldn’t even put a finger on why today, of all days.

Had his reactions been getting better recently? He tried to think back, suddenly scrutinising every part of his life that he could remember for the past few days.

Perhaps they had been, and he just hadn’t noticed.

There had been a moment two days ago where Michelle’s advice about trying exposure therapy, and spending more time closer to his death, had popped into his head. He had spent a minute or two staring at his death at the time, but it hadn’t felt like any difference had been made.

Maybe his brain had been working at it without him even realising.

“Flat white for Bucky!”

Bucky jumped when he heard his name.

He span around, and picked up the coffee where it was being offered to him.

When he turned back around, to leave, his death was right next to him.

The fear began to bubble and boil in his stomach again. The darkness of the folds, the endless void where a face should have been – it all still seemed so horrifying again all of a sudden.

It was the main catalyst for Bucky hightailing it out of the shop, if he was being honest.

Even with the fear returned, he still felt hopeful.

**

The next few weeks passed with Steve and Bucky meeting as often as possible. Bucky had slipped himself into Steve’s life easily, so simply, to the point where Steve wondered how he’d ever managed without him.

There was one downside, in the form of his mom becoming ill again. It was at the worst possible time as well – only three days before thanksgiving. Steve had been entirely prepared to not celebrate it at all. And that was the point where Bucky had offered to let him come over to his for it.

It had taken Steve a while to warm up to the idea, but eventually the idea was too much to resist. It ended up being a lot less awkward than he expected, and he wasn’t complaining about that.

It wasn’t enough to make the worries about his mom go away though – and even a week after that, when she was able to come back from the hospital, it still wasn’t gone.

He couldn’t even keep Bucky away for long though, and he had Bucky over at his mom’s apartment.

**

“Remember, you need to be quiet,” Steve said, waiting outside the door. Bucky only felt his trepidation increase.

Still, he nodded. Steve opened the door noiselessly, and together they crept in, trying to avoid making too much noise on the wooden floor.

On the bed in the centre of the room lay a woman. She didn’t look ill – she wasn’t pale, or thin, at least not in the way that Bucky would have expected. She was sleeping, though – immediately Bucky recognised this as the reason for them needing to stay silent.

Steve glanced over at him. they shared a look – one which said ‘what do we do now?’

Bucky looked back at the bed. Mrs rogers let out a small snore.

All of a sudden, he felt like he was intruding. This wasn’t something that he was meant to see. There was suddenly something very vulnerable about the whole situation – and he couldn’t imagine that Mrs rogers would be very pleased at the idea of him seeing her like this.

Why had Steve suggested this in the first place, again?

Steve began to go about tidying up a bit like there was nothing strange going on. That in itself was ever so slightly awkward – like he was seeing something that only went on in private spaces. There was nothing he could do, though. he didn’t know where things were meant to go. He didn’t know which things were already tidied.

But he couldn’t leave the room either. Not when it would make him look rude.

Mrs Rogers’ death was in the room too. It made Bucky extra uncomfortable that she might actually be at risk of being taken away by her death.

Eventually it seemed like Steve had finished putting things back in place. They crept out of the room, staying just as silent as they had been on the way in.

Steve closed the door behind them with a click. They said nothing until they’d moved a little way down from the door.

“She doesn’t look good,” Bucky remarked in a low whisper. “How’s she been doing?” He felt rather guilty that he hadn’t asked about her enough. It was his boyfriend’s mom, but… somehow he had never wanted to bring it up when they were together, not wanting to make him unnecessarily sad.

Steve shrugged. “She’s been doing better,” he said, in a slightly louder voice than Bucky’s. “I know it might not look it now, but I promise that it’s better than it was.”

It occurred to Bucky then that it made sense that he hadn’t been invited over any sooner – if Mrs rogers had been worse, she wouldn’t have wanted visitors. “I’m glad to hear it,” he said, and he meant it.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t have made that more exciting for you,” Steve said, changing the topic slightly. “I know you’ve met my mom before, but… I wanted to make this one a little more special.”

Bucky shrugged. “It’s okay,” he said. It wasn’t like they could help her being asleep the whole time. She was busy being very sick, she was allowed to be.

More interestingly were the hundreds of pictures which lined the walls. A familiar blond head starred in most of them – although some also had Mrs rogers in them too. They seemed to range all over the place in time. Most of the ones that were in Bucky’s line of sight were fairly recent. Steve’s graduation picture, one of the two of them on a beach, one of Steve laughing in the middle of a forest. All of them were excellent.

(He might have snuck a couple of pictures of them on his phone. Especially the one that was out of place, a bit – one of Steve in the bath as a baby.)

“What are you doing?” Bucky jumped as he heard Steve’s voice behind him.

“Nothing,” he said quickly, putting his phone away.

Steve looked like he believed exactly nothing. A sensible plan. “Were you admiring the way that my mom has tried to decorate the entire apartment in pictures of me?” Steve said, a resigned smile on his face.

“…Maybe,” Bucky admitted.

Steve grinned. "Well then you should come see the really good ones." He was led through to the living room next. Which had even more wall space. It wasn't entirely covered in pictures, but it was a close thing.

He had to step closer just to be able to look at them properly.

"I think this one is my favourite," Steve said, pointing at one right in the middle of the cluster. He looked to be about 15 in it - but, knowing how small and slight Steve was, he could have been anything up to 20. He was stood next to a lake, half turned away from the camera. It was impossible to tell whether he hadn't noticed his picture being taken, or if he was just posing. Bucky liked to think that it was the former, though.

Bucky nodded. They looked silently together at the wall of pictures.

There was a whole sub collection of pictures of Steve in the hospital. It was simultaneously adorable and sad - he was so young in all of them that he was a cute child, but it was also a disheartening reminder that he had spent so much of his time in the hospital.

"How old were you here?" Bucky asked, running light fingers over one of them. Steve was sat up in a hospital bed, grinning and showing off that a few of his teeth were missing.

Steve moved to stand next to him. "About seven, I think."

It was too difficult to even imagine what it must have been like to spend that much time in hospital that young. It wasn't even like this was something they'd never discussed before - it had just hit him hard in this moment.

Then one of them caught his eye. A boy and his death, sitting together on a bed. He couldn't put his finger on it - but something about that scene looked awfully familiar to him.

Maybe it was just because he had seen a lot of pictures of small Steve in the past ten minutes? Maybe it was because he was used to seeing Steve and his death being close?

He kept staring at it, like that would make it all make sense.

"What's wrong?" He heard Steve ask, but he didn't have the energy to answer.

"I - have I seen this picture before?" He asked.

Steve was silent. Then, "what?"

Realising that this probably made no sense, he looked at Steve, who looked very confused. "I just think I might have seen it before, that's all," he explained. "I... I don't know, though."

Steve frowned. "I don't think you could have. I mean, I don't own any copies of it, so unless you've been coming here without me, it shouldn't be possible."

_“Not why you’re in my room, silly,” Steve said, still giggling. “Why are you in the hospital?”_

It was Steve's voice, in his head, but so much younger. A child's. Where had that come from? He must have made it up, surely - making it fit with the scene in front of him.

Then Steve's death meandered over to them, going to wait at his shoulder like he usually did. It almost mirrored the picture he was looking at.

_Steve as a young child, eagerly offering to play a game of chess with him. Bucky at a time where Steve's closeness with his death was impressive, not horrifying._

He blinked, trying to get rid of the images in his head. Why was his brain trying to insert himself into this scene? Out of all of them, it was the worst one he could have chosen.

"How much company did you have while you were in hospital?" Bucky asked, his own imagination making him realise how lonely it must have been.

Steve shrugged. "Not a whole lot," he said. "Most of the time I was by myself in a room - I was so sick that most of the time they couldn't afford to have me around any of the other kids."

"So you never saw anyone else? Ever?" Bucky asked in increasing hopefulness that he really had just been making up what he had seen in his mind.

Steve frowned. "I - I don't think so? Other than nurses, if that's what you mean." He chuckled to himself. Bucky couldn't bring himself to do the same. Not when his thoughts were still so consumed by the fact that he was going to have to figure all this out.

"That's not what I mean," Bucky said distractedly, examining the picture more in an attempt to convince himself that everything was fine. That he was imagining everything.

“I don’t know what you do mean then.”

Bucky’s thoughts were still scattered. “I mean did you get visitors, ever?” It came out weirdly, and he couldn’t bring himself to correct it.

Steve frowned – more than he already was. “Not really. I didn’t have very many friends, remember? Not going to school made that impossible.”

Bucky sighed. Well, that was it then, it was all fake, #confirmed –

“There was one weird evening where I had one visitor I didn’t know.” Steve interrupted his thoughts with more musings.

Bucky’s heart began to race.

“Really?”

“Yeah… I don’t even remember it all that well, but I think that I liked him.” Steve shrugged. “I’m not even sure why he was there. It’s really more of a half-remembered dream.”

“You were trying to play chess, and I interrupted you…” Bucky’s voice was quiet, and he was still focussed too much on the photograph for him to pay attention to what he was saying.

He could _feel_ Steve’s attention snap into place. The gears were spinning, putting two and two together with what he’d just said.

”_You_?” Steve’s voice went high pitched with shock.

Bucky frowned. “Is that such a terrible thing?” It was difficult tell what Steve’s tone had meant to be, but it had sounded distinctly negative.

“I…”

Bucky turned to look at his boyfriend. His mouth was hanging slightly open – just enough to show surprise. Actually, Bucky couldn’t blame him on that. It wasn’t like he had even suspected this either.

It took a minute, but eventually Steve seemed to regain some of his brainpower. “I just… because of your fear of your death, I guess I forgot that you wouldn’t have always been.” Colour began to cover his cheekbones.

“Well I guess I should have guessed that it was you, knowing how much you love your death.” Bucky grinned over at Steve.

Even though Steve still looked a tad embarrassed, Bucky found some of the irritation in him fading away. After all, it was such a strange situation they’d found themselves in.

“Sorry,” Steve said contritely. “You know I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just…. I think having younger you be so different makes it feel not real.”

“It’s weird,” Bucky said, shaking his head. “Can you believe the coincidence it would need for us to meet as kids?”

“You’re right,” Steve chuckled. “I guess we must just be fated to meet.”

It was a weirdly comforting thought. Bucky had never been the type to believe in fate, but part of him thought that it might be true.

He slung an arm around Steve’s tiny shoulders and pulled him close. He couldn’t remember exactly what young Steve had been like – even with the visual aid, it had been too long since then – but he got the impression that not much had actually changed in Steve since then.

And that was a good thing.

**

It wasn’t something that Bucky planned. They had known that they had that connection for a few weeks – it wasn’t new to them anymore. But now Steve knew, he had that confirmation that he hadn’t always felt that way about his death. He couldn’t hide behind any of it any more.

It was almost certain that it would happen eventually. He couldn’t hide that from Steve forever, no matter how much his instincts screamed at him to.

And then it came out of nowhere.

“So what actually happened?”

Steve’s fingers carded through his hair, pulling away all the tangles. Despite the small amount of pain that it caused, it was more soothing than anything else.

“It was the torture that did it, more than anything.”

The carding motions stopped. “The what?” Steve’s voice was tight.

Right, that had probably been the wrong place to start. He stayed where he was – he didn’t want to move, he was too comfortable. (He also didn’t want to have to face Steve while he talked about this.)

He sighed, and squeezed his eyes tight shut for a moment.

“I think out of all of it, I was glad that they caught me and not Becca.”

Steve’s arm moved from his head to his middle, holding him tightly. “Right.”

It sounded like Steve had realised that Bucky wasn’t going to be able to tell this story easily, or even in a way that made total sense. It was a good sign.

He took one more breath. It made his whole body shake. “It wasn’t even me that they were after. We never did find out exactly what they’d been planning on doing in the first place, but… I don’t doubt that it would have been worse for her.”

He closed his eyes and tried to keep himself in the present. It helped that the room was well lit. Even when his eyes were closed, it was impossible to ignore.

“They had me in a basement,” he whispered. He couldn’t tell if Steve had heard him or not, but he wasn’t even sure by this point whether he was telling Steve the story, or himself. “I thought they were going to kill me. I really did – I mean, they kept threatening to, and I.. I believed them. They’d already taken me and hidden me away, I didn’t’ have any reason to believe that they wouldn’t.”

“…But clearly they didn’t?” Steve said. Bucky could appreciate the fact that he was trying to make this whole thing sound lighter. It wasn’t necessarily going to work, but it was still a good point.

Bucky shrugged as well as he could while lying down. “Yeah, they didn’t, but at what cost?”

Steve said nothing. Bucky could feel his boyfriend’s bony ribs pressing into his back as he breathed in, though, and it helped.

“So – so I thought it was going to kill me. Being down there, and stuff – and they didn’t really feed me often enough, so I was out of it for most of the time. Like – it didn’t really feel real? And I sometimes wasn’t sure if I was dead yet, or not.” The words were like fire in his mouth, burning his tongue as they slid out.

“But this doesn’t have to do with your death?” Steve asked. This time he sounded hopeful.

“Are you kidding? It made me terrified of every movement my death made.” Bucky snorted bitterly. “That was how it ties into my death.”

Steve’s apologetic hum made Bucky feel a little better.

Bucky sighed. “I’m sure you’ve noticed the way I flinch when my death comes close. I… I just got so used to the idea that I was going to die any time soon that I thought they were coming to take me every time they came close. I… I’m pretty sure that they were mostly just trying to comfort me, but I was so out of it that I couldn’t see it that way.”

Steve’s hand began to stroke his front again.

He groaned, knowing how ridiculous all of this sounded. “It sounds awful to be scared of your death, I know,” he said, trying to offset what was sure to come. “I couldn’t help it though. and – I mean, have you ever looked at a death? As far as I’m concerned there’s a reason they were the inspiration for grim reapers, because they really look weird when you think about it.”

Steve snorted against his back – then immediately said, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to do that.” He didn’t sound very much like he meant it though, and Bucky appreciated that.

“I know,” Bucky said, patting Steve’s hand.

For a minute they lay there in silence. The mood had turned lighter, and Bucky didn’t want to have to darken it again.

Eventually he reached the point where he knew he had to continue telling Steve what had happened.

“It didn’t help that they noticed how scared I was,” he said quietly.

Immediately the mood dropped.

“You mean that wasn’t enough?” Steve asked. His voice was incredulous – and Bucky couldn’t blame him for that.

He shook his head as best as he could while lying down. “Nope. I – even though I was scared of them, I still couldn’t bear to let them out of my sight? You know how normally it hurts to have your death go too far away?”

Steve nodded against his back.

“Well that didn’t go away, even when I was scared of them.”

There was a pause. Then, “so they took your death away from you?” Steve sounded horrified.

Bucky swallowed. “Yeah.”

“Why – how could they do that? Who would…?” Steve could barely get a coherent sentence out.

“It wasn’t like they didn’t know what they were doing,” Bucky said. “I mean, they could see how much pain I was in. they knew exactly what was up.”

He took a deep, shuddering breath.

“So then they made sure to do that as much as possible. I – I didn’t really get a break from it. Honestly I think they liked seeing me struggle when they took my death away, and then again when they brought them back. It was like… the worst kind of double whammy.” It was such a strange thing to say out loud.

“But how did they manage to keep your death away in the first place?” Steve asked. “I mean, they’re meant to be able to go anywhere with us.” He sounded confused.

“I don’t really know to be honest,” Bucky said, wishing that he had a better answer. “I know the first few times they just came back through the wall to me, but then they did something – I don’t know what I just know there was a whole lot of construction that day – and then bam, my death couldn’t follow me back in. I think they did something to the wall, put something on it that kept a death out.”

There was silence while they both thought about the implications of that.

“Well I’m glad those guys are locked away if they have tech like that,” Steve said resolutely.

“Yeah, me too.”

“…So did you ever get any better?” Steve asked hopefully.

Bucky held back a sigh. He could tell that Steve really wanted him to say yes. It was going to pain him to say no.

“No, if anything it got worse after that. It got to the point where I enjoyed my death being gone more, because I couldn’t even really feel the pain of them being gone properly – it got to the point where I was too hungry and too numb to notice any extra discomfort there.”

“Was there not any kind of difference when they came back though? Surely that should be something that stays the same no matter what?” Steve said desperately.

Bucky bit his lip. “Well… a bit yeah, but not enough to make a big enough difference. Besides, they weren’t bringing them back so that I wouldn’t die, it was just so that they could see me scream about it.”

Steve let out a shuddering sigh against Bucky’s back. It was warm, and made the hairs at the nape of Bucky’s neck tingle. “So… that’s where it all started, then? Your fear, I mean.”

“Yeah, pretty much.” Bucky closed his eye, squeezing them just a bit. “I just…. There’s so much pain associated with them that I just can’t stand the idea of looking at them, you know? I just – every time there’s a little bit of that mixed fear of losing them, but also thinking that I’m going to die every time. And – and the worst part about the fear of losing them is that sometimes I want nothing more than for them to be gone. I don’t even really worry about that any more, but without me even wanting it, it’s there, stuck in my brain like a metal rod.”

The whole time Bucky was talking, Steve’s arms had been tightening around Bucky. “So – so what did people think when you got out? I mean, you did get out – you’re here, I’m not trying to…”

Bucky took pity on Steve. “Yeah, don’t worry about it. Me getting out was… well, I actually don’t remember it all that well. All I do know was that those guys got raided for something else completely, and they just happened to find me along with everything else in that hovel.”

“Jeez…”

“I know, I know. I mean, I’m glad I got out – I don’t think my family have ever been so happy to see me – but I wish I didn’t have any of this to deal with, you know?” He said quickly, like if he didn’t, they would never be said.

“I wish that too,” Steve whispered.

“It was just so hard to hide, you know?” Bucky continued, the words not wanting to stop yet. “I mean, what with how people are meant to feel about their deaths, it’s sort of hard to tell anyone that actually you can’t stand the damn sight of them.”

There was a moment of silence. Then, “I can’t even imagine how hard that must be.” It sort of sounded like Steve didn’t quite know what to say.

“Yeah, well you’ve seen me try to deal with it for the past few months. It’s easier sometimes, like if I’m alone and my death just does their own thing. But the moment I’m out in crowds, or if my death is being weirdly clingy, then I just can’t help it. And that was even worse at first, because literally nobody guessed that it might have been a side effect of what I went through.”

“Did you never think to try talking to your death?” Steve asked, sounding oh so optimistic.

Bucky laughed before he could think it through at all. He felt Steve tense up behind him – and he went to explain before it sounded too mean. “I think I did, you know? Like, at first, maybe just when nobody else could hear me. Maybe some long buried part of me remembered you being besties with your death and thought I should try it.”

“And did it work?” That, despite the fact that Steve had never seen him talking to his death in all the time they’d known each other.

Oh, if only Bucky had had that kind of optimism. Maybe things would have turned out differently then.

He shook his head. “It didn’t – I think if nothing else it made it worse, because then it made it more frustrating for me.”

Steve hummed disappointedly. “Shit, I can’t even imagine how I’d survive without being able to talk to my death”

“I know,” Bucky said, half amused despite himself. The conversation was dark, he shouldn’t be feeling like this – but Steve’s optimism was catching.

Steve continued. “Like, it was just such a helpful thing for me as a kid,” he said, sounding like he was trying to convince Steve.

“Yeah, with you and your weird friendship,” Bucky snorted.

Steve huffed, “look, when you’re in a hospital by yourself for hours on end, you learn to make your own entertainment, and that involved talking to my death”

“Well it just never worked for me,” Bucky said. It almost felt like he should have been upset about it – but he was so used to that being their dynamic that it was just… normal.

Steve cleared his throat. “So you just had to… put up with a death you couldn’t communicate with?” He asked, changing the subject back to what it was before.

“Pretty much. I managed to keep it secret for a few months, but that was mostly just because I didn’t talk to my parents about any of it for ages. But eventually I couldn’t get away with it anymore, and they wanted me to talk more, and I just couldn’t keep it away from them.” He left out the part where his parents were suspicious about it for a while. It was sort of implied that he was never that great at it to begin with.

“And that’s when they started making you go to therapy?”

“Yeah, you got it. I don’t think it helped all that much though,” Bucky admitted.

Steve laughed. “Clearly, since you’re only talking about it now”

“Ssssssh”

“I’m so sorry you feel that way about your death,” Steve said, pressing closer.

“Well it’s not something I try to think about too much…. It’s become my norm in a weird kind of way.” Bucky said, knowing that it was probably a bad thing.

“I mean, you know that it shouldn’t be, right?” Steve said, unintentionally echoing Bucky’s thoughts.

“That’s not the point…” Bucky said, trying not to sound too uncomfortable.

Steve shook his head. “No, like, I think you know it’s not healthy to go about like that.”

“I’ve been trying to work on it, but it’s hard to get rid of something like that.”

“Well so long as you try”

**

“Well,” said Michelle, putting her glasses down on the table. “I’m not sure if that was what I was expecting.”

Bucky began to play with the sleeve of his hoodie nervously. He shrugged. “I know,” he said. It wasn’t like he’d been expecting for Michelle to say that she’d suspected it all along. Not when it was such a strange tale.

“I’m glad you had the courage to tell me about it though,” she said, smiling up at him. “I know it must have taken a lot.”

Bucky swallowed the lump that had formed in his throat without his permission. “Yeah, well, I told Steve about it the other day, and – and I thought I should probably tell you too, I guess,” he said, staring resolutely at his shoes.

“And I’m very happy that you did,” she said. “I hope that this will be a changing point in your life.”

It made Bucky happy to realise that he had already had that thought. Maybe he was learning.

Maybe it really would be a time for change.

**

Bucky hid at the bottom of the stairs, his body obscured by the bottom banister, he knew. His death was behind him, like he’d told them to be. It was the perfect place to watch his mom going about the kitchen.

(There was the good smell of dinner coming from it – and while Bucky’s stomach was definitely affected by it, he had to ignore it for now. There were more important things going on.)

He had to time this right if he wanted a chance to get how way.

“Come on,” he whispered to his death. As he stood up slowly, and prepared to go over to his mom, his death came with him, attached as they were.

Trying not to walk too stiffly, Bucky walked quietly over the wooden floor, his socks making the barest of swishing noise as he did.

“Hey mom,” he said when he was pretty much right behind her.

Weirdly, it made her jump. She turned around, pot in hand and eyes wide. “Bucky! How many times have I told you to stop sneaking up on me?” she scolded.

Right, yeah, she had said that before. “Sorry mom,” he said, only meaning it a little bit. He was on a mission, and she was just interrupting that now!

She turned away from him. he frowned. Why wasn’t she paying attention to him when he’d clearly already tried to get it?

He tapped her on the shoulder. She didn’t respond. He tapped again.

“What is it Bucky?” his mom snapped.

He clasped his hands together. He had to word this is just the right way so that she’d say yes. “So you know how we were at the hospital the other day?”

The sound of his mom putting the pot she had been washing down was good. It meant she was going to pay attention to him.

When she didn’t immediately turn around, Bucky decided that he needed to ramp things up a bit. Instead of standing behind her and waiting for her to turn to him, he walked forward to stand beside her, so that he could twist and look at her properly.

Oh – now that he was closer he could see that she was still working on cleaning. “Mom?” He asked again.

This time she looked at him. “Why are you asking about the hospital?” Her voice sounded weird, but Bucky couldn’t figure out why.

Now this was the bit Bucky had been excited to talk about. “Well when we were there I talked to someone,” he said. “Can I go back and see him?”

His mom’s hands stopped. “You talked to someone?” Her voice was tight, and Bucky couldn’t possibly imagine why. Some of his excitement faded to frustration that his mom wasn’t getting it.

“Yeah, there was a boy in a room, and I saw him when I went to get a candy bar, and now I want to go see him again!” Bucky bounced on the balls of his feet, sure that this would convince her. It was a pretty good reason, honestly.

His mom frowned. She pulled the pot out of the soapy water, and placed it on the drying rack. “I don’t remember you meeting anyone while we were there.” She sounded a bit calmer now – something which made him more excited.

“I did, I did!” Bucky bounced more. It was very important that she understood how much he needed to go see his friend.

“And what’s this person’s name?” She asked, turning to him properly.

“Steve! He’s my age, and he’s all alone in there!” Bucky offered as much information as he could, trying to show that he really did know Steve.

His mom sighed, and walked away a little. Bucky followed. “I just don’t think it’s a good idea,” his mom said after he stared at her for a minute while he waited.

Bucky’s eyes filled with tears. “But why?” He insisted. “Steve needs to see me!”

“Are you sure that Steve really exists?” His mom’s next question caught him off guard.

He blinked. “Yes, of course he’s real,” he said, clenching his fists. “He’s my friend, and I need to see him.”

“Bucky, you’ve always had a very active imagination,” his mom sighed. “But now is not the time. You know that your sister is still recovering, and I don’t have time to indulge you in taking you on a two hour car ride to get to the hospital where your imaginary friend is.”

“He’s not imaginary!” Bucky insisted. “He’s real, he’s real.”

“I don’t think he is,” his mom said firmly. “Now I need to take your sister her dinner – don’t ask me about this anymore.”

“No!” Bucky said, getting in between his mom and where Becca’s plate was on the table. “You _need_ to take me there, _please_.” His eyes filled with tears again, and this time one of them escaped, rolling down his cheek.

“Don’t give me your crocodile tears again, Bucky.” His mom sounded even more exasperated now, which only made him cry harder.

All he could imagine now was Steve, all alone in his room, waiting for Bucky to come and being disappointed when he didn’t. He was letting his newest and bestest friend down.

“If you won’t take me, then I’ll go by myself!” Bucky cried, making a dash for the door. His mom was wrong – it couldn’t possibly take that long for him to walk to the hospital. It wasn’t that far, and he was a strong boy.

He was nearly at the door, arm outstretched to open it, when his mom said, “oh no you don’t.” A firm hand grabbed his shoulder and pulled him back.

Bucky gasped with shock – why was he being stopped? He was pulled around roughly to face his mom. “Why won’t you let me go?” More tears fell from his eyes.

“You can’t possibly walk all the way to the hospital now, it’s already dark outside,” his mom said. Now she sounded properly angry – and that scared Bucky a bit. Her death was by her shoulder now, where they had been absent before. It was like they were backing her up, like they were both ganging up on him.

He took a step back. His own death was also behind him. He didn’t need to look to know that – he could feel the chill flowing through his clothes and to him. It was comforting. It was a reminder that just like how his mom had her death to back him up, that he had his death too.

He sniffed. “But what will I do if Steve needs me?”

His mom sighed. She slumped. Hopefully it would be a sign that she wasn’t mad at him anymore. “I think Steve will be just fine,” she told him. “You don’t need to worry about him.”

“You really think so?” Bucky hadn’t thought about that before. Steve had seemed pretty strong when he saw him before. It was a pretty good point.

His mom nodded, and stood up properly. “If he’s a friend of yours, I have no doubts that he’s doing great.”

Bucky cocked his head to the side as he considered this. “…But can I still go see him?”

His mom had already turned away from him, and she twisted to look back. “We’ll see.”

\---

Bucky woke up. ”_We’ll see_.” What famous last words those had been.

He’d not forgotten about for a while longer, but every time he had asked his mom about it, she had said no, to the point that it was out of sight, out of mind. The fact that his mom had assumed that Steve was a figment of his imagination was a whole other thing entirely.

Actually, even after all those years, it still sort of stung that she hadn’t believed him.

He rolled over. Steve was still asleep next to him, snoring lightly. It helped to bring him back to the present, even if he couldn’t really see Steve at all in the darkness. Even if he hadn’t been able to see Steve again while they were children, they still had somehow managed to find their way back to each other nearly 20 years later.

He closed his eyes. Part of him wanted to message his mom right now, and tell her all about this. The fact that they hadn’t gotten round to telling either of their parents about their meeting as children was something that had been niggling at the back of his mind for the past couple of weeks. It had only been light though – and this had ramped it up somewhat.

It would wait til the morning though. she would be sleeping.

**

Steve rolled over. The bed was warm… too warm, in fact.

He groaned, and threw the covers off of him. That was better – it let the breeze get to him, cooled his body down.

Why was it so warm in here anyway? He wondered.

He wasn’t curious enough to go check why it was, though – his brain was too sleepy to deal with the idea of waking up fully enough to do anything about it.

Just as he was dropping off again, just as his mind began to go foggy, there was a groan from the other side of the bed, matching his in tone and intensity.

It was small – but it was enough to catch Steve off guard.

Whether he liked it or not, his consciousness was floating back to the surface, the warm thickness of sleep unwinding itself from his mind.

With that came the remembrance of two facts.

  1. it was Christmas day
  2. Bucky was currently in his bed

He rolled over. Now that he could think properly, he began to worry that he might have woken Bucky up with his noises, and he carefully looked over at his boyfriend.

Bucky’s eyes were still closed (thankfully) and Steve took this as a good sign. If Bucky was awake, he’d probably know about it.

He relaxed again.

Steve took a moment to just take it all in. He was too awake to go back to sleep now, but he didn’t want to get up yet either.

Bucky snuffled in his sleep. It was adorable.

Steve stroked over Bucky’s hair lightly, just enough to be comforting, but not enough to wake him up.

Sure enough, Bucky stayed fast asleep. Steve didn’t want to wake him up so soon – not when it was still so early. Bucky had been getting better at not sleeping the day away, but it was Christmas. Steve was pretty sure he could let Bucky get away with sleeping in on this day.

Mentally he ran through the setup they had. They hadn’t gone out too far with the decorations in Steve’s apartment, with Steve claiming that he didn’t have enough space to fit a big tree in it. It was true enough, even if Bucky hadn’t been happy about it. Besides, he didn’t have the money to splurge out in the way that they might have wanted. They were going to go to Bucky’s parents in the morning, and then over to Steve’s mom’s in the afternoon. It would hopefully be a good split between their two families.

That wasn’t going to be for a good couple of hours yet though.

They would have plenty of time to relax before then.

Steve didn’t have any intentions of going to sleep again right now. He might have been too sleepy earlier, but now that he was awake he was fully awake he wanted to stay that way.

He settled back down. Slowly, gently, he pulled Bucky closer to him.

Bucky snuffled – but he didn’t wake up.

Steve squeezed Bucky closer to him. he could already feel the excitement growing inside him. Excitement for the day to come – but also excitement for what would come after that. For the life that they were going to live. For all the other Christmases that would be.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Title Cards for Momento Mori](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21165872) by [Taste_is_Sweet](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Taste_is_Sweet/pseuds/Taste_is_Sweet)


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